A male and female slave playing instruments Wellcome L0037783

The reco-reco (also called the raspador, caracaxá or querequexé) is a scraper of African origin used as a

percussion instrument A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

Brazilian music The music of Brazil encompasses various regional musical styles influenced by European, American, African and Amerindian forms. Brazilian music developed some unique and original styles such as forró, repente, coco de roda, axé, sertanejo ...

,ROCCA, Edgar Nunes "Bituca", ''Escola Brasileira de Música: Uma visão Brasileira no ensino da música e seus instrumentos de percussão 1''. Rio de Janeiro: Europa, EBM, 1986 but also in many Latin American countries, where it is known as

güiro The güiro () is a percussion instrument consisting of an open-ended, hollow gourd with parallel notches cut in one side. It is played by rubbing a stick or tines (see photo) along the notches to produce a ratchet sound. The güiro is commonly ...

güira The güira () is a percussion instrument from the Dominican Republic used in merengue, bachata, and to a lesser extent, other genres such as cumbia. It is made of a metal sheet (commonly steel) and played with a stiff brush, thus being similar ...

guayo The guayo or ralladera is a metal scraper used as a percussion instrument in traditional styles of Cuban music such as changüí, predecessor of son cubano. Largely replaced by the güiro (gourd scraper) during the 20th century, the guayo is now ...

and

guacharaca Guacharaca is a percussion instrument found in Colombia. It is a rasp named after a bird ( ''ortalis guttata'') whose call it is said to imitate. It is usually made out of the cane-like trunk of a small palm tree. The guacharaca itself consists ...

. Traditionally, the reco-reco was made from a sawtooth notched cylindrical body made of

bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of mostly evergreen perennial plant, perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily (biology), subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family, in th ...

wood Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin t ...

, and played with a wooden stick. The instrument is used in many styles of Brazilian music, such as

samba Samba () is a broad term for many of the rhythms that compose the better known Brazilian music genres that originated in the Afro-Brazilians, Afro Brazilian communities of Bahia in the late 19th century and early 20th century, It is a name or ...

and related genres. For some time, reco-recos have been made of a metallic cylinder with springs attached and played with a metal stick, which results in a much louder sound. In some models, the sound box has a hole on the bottom part, which can be covered with the hand to achieve different timbral possibilities. Nowadays, reco-recos have also been made out of

fiberglass Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English) is a common type of fibre-reinforced plastic, fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened i ...

, but the wooden version remains the most popular.

Notes

References

Dicionário Cravo Albin da Música Popular Brasileira
Scraped idiophones Brazilian musical instruments {{Brazil-music-stub

See also

Notes

References