Bugarabu Drum Stands

Latest update: April 11, 2009

Drum Stands for Bugarabus

Bugarabus are normally played in groups of three or four, much like congas in salsa music. Unlike congas, many bugarabu stands lean the heads away from the drummer. I've seen photos and videos of them where the drums are slanted as far down as 45°. Others are played straight upright, conga-style.

I personally like playing drums either of these ways, but I was interested in trying the slant style for the Taqueria Trio. Upright stands usually feature a horizontal board with large holes cut into them. The drums are each dropped into a hole sized to fit it. Slant stands are often of the style similar to the one you see at right ->

Buying a Stand
One sure way to get a good stand for a bugarabu is to buy one designed for jembes from a drum accessory company, such as Toca, LP, and Meinl. The examples at right, sent to me buy a drummer from Poland, is from Meinl. They required a few modifications, since they were designed for djembes.

He braced the arm with a fur-padded metal rod. The strap (black, just above the "collar") had to be lengthened to fit the longer bowl. These kinds of stands allow a lot of freedom, such as angle and position. Of course, the downside is they cost money.

The Taqueria Conga Stand
I most often use a conga stand for my bugarabus. It is designed for two drums, but with a few modifications, it holds three bugarabus just fine. It has two advantages over the slant stand (below). It takes up less room, and it is easier to play the right and left drums in quick succession, since they are closer together. The monkey is optional.

Notice in the conga stand photos the yellow rope on the largest drum. Unlike the other two, which have tight, even rope patterns, this one has the rope gathered in bunches. If I had gathered every vertical, the drum would be tuned too high. If I had gone only partway (I wanted it about 2/3), the tension on the head would be uneven. It would be tighter on one side than the other. By skipping verticals, you can go all the way around the drum and tighten only the ones you want to, thus spreading the tension evenly around the circumference.

The other two drums both have two complete rows.

The Taqueria Slant Stand
I have made stands of this style before for other percussion instruments. They are relatively light, fold flat, and are remarkably stable. I put mine together completely with screws, allowing me to disassemble any parts to make adjustments. When you're looking at these photos, please keep in mind I paid little attention to workmanship and focused on design, strength, and practicality.

The stand is light, easy to carry, and folds flat.

The front consists of two legs one meter (39") long and a flat panel that extends down far enough to support the shell of the longest drum. This panel adds rigidity to the overall frame and strength for the top cross member. In my first attempt, I had a cross member between these two legs. Since it did little to add rigidity, I removed it for lightness and to allow me to stand between the legs. The top crossmember sits atop the upper ends of the legs.

The other structural piece is the back leg unit. Each of of these legs is 69cm (27") long. This one still has a lower cross member, which is absolutely necessary for rigidity. The legs are attached to the front frame with hinges.

I added the upper crossmember when I added wheels (see transporting, below).

The legs are prevented from spreading by two static line climbing ropes, the same ones used for the drum tuning. The height and angle of the stand can be adjusted by changing the lengths of these ropes.

One thing I want to do in the future is come up with an idea about how to finish off the bottoms of the legs.

Finally, after long walks through The Home Depot, I decided on a setup for anchoring the drums. I put six heavy screws, two for each drum, into the lower front of the top cross member. Later, I added four more screws between the other pairs, aligned for when I play only two drums.

How I anchored the drums required the deepest thought, as I want to be able to quickly change the order of the drums for different rhythms. Since the drums are different diameters, I originally had a system that allowed me to slide the anchoring points to center them above their respective drums.

However, I ended up fixing their positions. The key was having two anchoring points for each drum. Not only did this make them more stable, it made the exact position of a drum unimportant as long as it hung somewhere between these points. A drum can be closer to one point than another.

At right is the stand after a few modifications and two coats of paint, mostly for weather protection.

Once I had the proportions of the stand worked out, I had another challenge to meet. Before making the stand, I could carry all three drums together. Inside duffel bags, I could carry one drum in each hand, and wear one on my back. But the stand adds a fourth component.

Transporting It All
Eventually, I thought that I should make the stand itself double as the transport. First, I drilled holes to allow the temporary attachment of wheels to the bottoms of the back legs. Each wheel is held in place by removable pins. I suppose I could have shortened the legs slightly and made the wheels permanent, but I didn't think of that until later.

At right is the stand in transport mode. The drums are in the same positions as during play. The stand is folded and leaned onto the back legs. This puts extra strain on the hinges. I hope they can hold up.

In this photo, I have yet to attach a handle. I plan to add one soon. It may end up like wheeled luggage.

Credit
On some of the design decisions, like the attachment points of the back legs and the use of hinges, I got advice from my brother, who is a civil engineer. Coincidentally, he was involved in the construction of the freeway bridge in the background of the photo at right. If I write that my stand has collapsed, don't trust this freeway!