Hi, I have a 5 1/2 inch dayan which I have been playing now for almost a year. It sounds great and stays in tune, but while listening to Aloke Dutta's training CD for Poetic drumming and through reading as well as other resources, my dayan is definately around E below the C or C# that seems so common on recordings. I currently have only one strap over the gatta and have been curious about raising the tasma to bring it up to C. I have found it extremely difficult to get the second strap over the gatta and have stoped for fear of damaging the drum. Should I try again or leave the drum at E. If I try again is, there any advice or tricks of the trade that may help me to raise the tasma ? any help from any of the more experienced players would be greatly appreciated. Thanking you in advance for your advice. Ray
If your pitch is at E (3rd white key) then surely you are trying to lower it to C# (2nd black key) which in that case you really don't need to raise to 2 straps on each ghatta (peg). In any case, good heads are often made to be at a certain pitch or range of normally 2 notes and if you are trying to adjust to the pitch outside of that range then the chances are that you will damage the head. Before you try to raise 2 straps on each ghatta check that the leather strap tension is equal all way around. Adding 2 to ghatta is very delicate job as you have to use both feet and both arms and a good deal of strength.
A better way and to test first is to take all the ghattas off and re-tension the strap and then add the ghatta with only one strap on each and see if the pitch and the tone feel good.
If you don't want to re-tension the strap then test the pitch level by raise the strap to 2 on only 4 ghattas facing each other and feel the pitch level. If you satisfied then apply to all ghattas.
Most important is to know which strap on the side of the ghatta that you use to raise onto the ghatta. Usually it is the underside strap from the top of the head and the next overside. It's a bit difficult to explain but doing it incorrectly you can run into all kinds of tuning problems.
