| Name | Image | Description | Video |
|---|---|---|---|
| Atabaque |  | The atabaque is a tall, wooden, Afro-Brazilian hand drum. The shell is made traditionally of Jacaranda wood from Brazil. The head is traditionally made from calfskin. A system of ropes are intertwined around the body, connecting a metal ring near the base to the head. Wooden wedges are jammed between this ring and the the body and one uses a hammer to tighten or loosen the ropes, raising or lowering the pitch of the drum. | |
| Berimbau |  | The berimbau is a single-string percussion instrument, a musical bow, from Brazil. The berimbau was eventually incorporated into the practice of the Afro-Brazilian martial art capoeira, where it commands how the capoeiristas move in the roda. The instrument is a part of Candomblé-de-caboclo tradition. | |
| Cabasa |  | The cabasa, similar to the shekere, is a percussion instrument that is constructed with loops of steel ball chain wrapped around a wide cylinder. The cylinder is fixed to a long, narrow wooden or plastic handle. It was constructed from dried oval- or pear-shaped gourds with beads strung on the outer surface. The image shows an afuche-cabasa. | |
| Caixa |  | A caixa is a Brazilian snare drum. It is the driving force in samba music where ghost notes are played continuously with accented strokes outlining the rhythm. The caixa is also used extensively in Reggaeton (a form of urban music which became popular with Latin American youth during the early 1990s), and in extreme metal to provide a blast beat. | |
| Cuica |  | Cuíca (pronounced KWEE-kah) is a Brazilian friction drum often used in samba music. The tone it produces has a high-pitched squeaky timbre. The body of the cuíca is normally made of metal. It has a single head, normally six to ten inches in diameter (15-25 cm), made of animal skin. A thin bamboo stick is attached to the centre of, and perpendicular to, the drum head, stretching into the drum's interior. The instrument is held under one arm at chest height with the help of a shoulder strap. To play the cuíca, the musician rubs the stick up and down with a wet cloth held in one hand, using the thumb of the other hand to press down on the skin of the drum near the place where the stick is attached. The rubbing motion produces the sound and the pitch is increased or decreased by changing the pressure on the thumb. | |
| Ganza |  | The ganzá, also called cholaho, is a Brazilian rattle used as a percussion instrument, especially in samba music. The ganza is cylindrically shaped, and can be either a hand-woven basket or a metal canister which is filled with beads, metal balls, pebbles, or other similar items. Those made from metal produce a particularly loud sound. | |
| Glass Marimba |  | The glass marimba is a crystallophone that is similar to the marimba, but has glass bars instead of wood bars. The bars, which the performer strikes with padded mallets, are perched on a glass box to provide the necessary resonance. Glass marimbas are utilised by the Brazilian percussion ensemble, Uakti. Uakti is known for using custom-made instruments, built by the Uakti group itself. The thickness and length of each bar determines the pitch. The longer and thinner a bar is - the lower its pitch will be. | |
| Rabeca |  | The rabeca is a traditional Brazilian fiddle. It is one of the instruments used in the street theaters of Pernambuco that unites music, dance, and poetry. | |
| Repinique |  | A repinique is a two-headed Brazilian drum used in samba baterias (percussion ensembles). It is used in the Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo Carnival baterias and in the baterias of Bahia, where it is known as repique. It is equivalent to the tom-tom in the Western drum kit. Typically its body is made of metal. The instrument is about the same width as the Brazilian caixa (snare drum) but several inches longer in height and lacking a snare. It is held using a shoulder strap attached to one of the tuning rods. In Rio-style samba it is played with one wooden stick and one hand. In Bahia it is played with two wooden sticks usually. | |
| Surdo |  | The surdo is a large bass drum used in many kinds of Brazilian music, most notably samba. Surdo sizes normally vary between 14" and 29" diameter. In Rio de Janeiro, surdos are generally 60cm deep. Surdos used in the northeast of Brazil are commonly more shallow (50cm deep). Surdos may have shells of wood, galvanized steel, or aluminum. Heads may be goatskin or plastic. A Rio bateria will commonly use surdos that have skin heads (for rich tone) with aluminum shells (for lightness). Surdos are worn from a waist belt or shoulder strap, oriented with the heads roughly horizontal. The bottom head is not played. | |
| Zabumba |  | A zabumba is a type of bass drum used in Brazilian music. It is made of boards of wood glued to alternating shafts of metal inside a cylindrical box, with one or two skins stretched atop it. It is played with sticks. The zabumba is used in the genres of forró, Coco, baião, xaxado and xote. |
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