Afro House Drum Machine: Build Rolling Conga Grooves in Your Browser
Afro house sits on a steady four-on-the-floor kick, but everything above it is deliberately off-grid: congas, cross-stick and shakers weave 3-against-4 figures that pull against the pulse instead of reinforcing it. The kick is round and long rather than clicky, the clap sits wide on beats 2 and 4, and a constant 16th-note shaker with its accent on the last 16th of each beat gives the groove its forward lean. Most tracks live between 118 and 126 BPM with a small amount of swing - just enough that the percussion stops sounding quantised.
How to program afro house drums
- Program the shaker on every 16th, then carve it with velocity: quiet on the downbeat, quietest on the 'e', medium on the 'and', loudest on the 'a'. That accent landing just before each beat is what makes the loop lope forward instead of marching.
- Build the congas as a tumbao, not as fills: two open low tones tied together on the 'a' of beats 2 and 4 (steps 6-7 and 14-15), with a hard high slap on the 'a' of beats 1 and 3. Keep the shape identical for two bars and change only the tail of bar 2 so the loop breathes.
- Set swing around 10-14, never 0 and never boom-bap territory. At zero the percussion sounds like a drum machine; past about 20 the congas start fighting the kick and you lose the four-on-the-floor anchor that the whole style rests on.
Wondering about tempo? What BPM is afro house? - 118-126 BPM, and why.
Other styles
- Boom Bap drum machine88-94 BPM
- Trap drum machine130-150 BPM (half-time feel)
- Lo-Fi Hip Hop drum machine70-85 BPM
- House drum machine120-126 BPM
- Techno drum machine130-140 BPM
- Drum and Bass drum machine172-176 BPM
- UK Garage drum machine130-135 BPM
- Funk drum machine100-110 BPM
- 808 drum machine100-130 BPM
Rhythm breakdowns
- Boom bap drum patterns: eight dialects, with MIDI and PDF80-94 BPM · cheat sheet
- Hi-hat patterns: trap, drill, house, garage and more8 genres · cheat sheet
- Hip hop drum patterns: all eight, with MIDI and PDF78-140 BPM · cheat sheet
- The Jungle Break: Syncopated Snares at 172172 BPM
- Boom Bap at 90 BPM: the dusty backbeat90 BPM
- Dilla-style drunk swing87 BPM
- Drill Hi-Hats: Triplet Stutters, 32nd Flicks and Gaps140 BPM
- Four on the Floor124 BPM
- The Full House Groove: Four on the Floor, Offbeat Hats and a Rolling Shaker124 BPM
- The Dembow Riddim96 BPM
- Trap Hi-Hats: 8ths, 32nd Bursts and a Triplet Turnaround140 BPM
- UK Garage 2-Step Drum Pattern: the Kick That Skips Beat 3133 BPM
BAP Studio is inspired by classic 16-pad sampler and drum-machine workflows. It is an independent project and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Akai Professional, Roland, or any other manufacturer.
Made by Max Berggren.