Salsa Beat Machine

Inspired by an old time Salsa classic song from Joe Arroyo, “En Barranquilla Me Quedo”, I have decided to add Guaguanco pattern to the Congas instrument of the Salsa Beat Machine.

Discovering the Guaguancó

The Guaguancó rhythm, a part of the afrocuban “Rumba” family, was developed back in the middle 1800′s, and can be still found today in many Salsa songs. The best is to listen to a few Guaguanco tunes to get familiar with it. Some of my favorite examples:

1. Hector Lavoe – Aguanile : The congas playing the guaguanco pattern can be easily heard during the big break in the middle of the song
2. Joey Pastrana – Rumbón Melón : The bass and the piano can be heard playing the Guaguanco pattern very clearly at 2:45
3. Joe Arroyo – En Barranquilla Me Quedo : Piano playing guaguanco at 0:30, 1:10

Make your Guaguancó Machine

Note that in order to play the guaguanco correctly, you have to tune the Beat Machine as the following:

1. Click on the Clave instrument, choose the “Rumba Clave” program, and 3-2 clave orientation
2. Click on the Congas instrument, and select one of the Guaguancó programs there.
3. Click on the Bass instrument, and select the Guaguancó 8-8-1-5 program

Conga drums

I like it in when it plays in the A# key, around 110BPM.

Once you have created a machine you are happy with, please click on the blue diskette icon and save it on our server. Then will get a link you can share, post it as a comment to this blog.

I’d love to see some of your creations…