Gong Playing Techniques

In this video I demonstrate various gong playing techniques using different mallets: Paiste M1, Paiste M6, Innovative Percussion CG2, Mike Balter GM4, Mike Balter WG1, Vic Firth Sound Power GB1, and various friction mallets (Yin Yang, Mike Balter, eWand). The gong I'm playing in this video is a Paiste 32" Symphonic.
Alexandre Tannous is as a musician, educator, composer, and an ethnomusicologist. He holds a Bachelor of Music in Theory and Composition, and a Master of Arts degree in Music Education from Columbia University Teachers College. As a recipient of the Mellon Fellowship he also earned a Master of Arts and a Master of Philosophy degrees in Ethnomusicology from Columbia University where he was enrolled in the PH.D. program. He has taught at Columbia University and is a frequent guest-lecturer at universities, institutions, and museums. As an ethnomusicologist, he has conducted fieldwork for 17 years in over 40 countries around the world.
For the past 15 years he has been researching the therapeutic and esoteric properties of sound from three different perspectives - Western scientific, Eastern philosophical, and shamanic societal beliefs - to gain a deeper understanding of how, and to what extent, sound has been used to affect human consciousness. This search has led him to the intersection where art, science, philosophy and spirituality intersect. His ethnomusicological approach entails a social scientific study of sound use in several traditional contexts-religious, spiritual, holistic, and cultural-for various purposes and occasions in entertainment, worship, meditation, and rituals of healing and trance. Consequently, his approach in researching, understanding, experiencing, transmitting, and working with sound has always been based on a multidisciplinary approach.
The material he transmits about sound is based on thorough research over many years: observations he made during his fieldwork, scientific studies, personal experiences, and data collected from thousands of people he has worked with doing sound therapy. This has led him to a deeper understanding of how sound reveals and unlocks hidden powers we have within us to promote profound inner changes and healing.
Inspired by his findings, he designed a protocol of an integrated experience he calls “Sound Meditation” in which he shares the findings from his research, raising an awareness to how a specifically designed sound can have the ability to help us to disconnect from habitual patterns while judiciously listening to the specific traditional instruments he plays. He employs a phenomenological approach to study the effects of sound, using a method that empowers the participants to engage actively with tools that enhance their experience, using the consciousness-altering properties of sound to heighten self-awareness, to connect to the higher self, to fine-tune self-observation, and to attain self-realization.
He currently works as a sound therapist, teaches this practice, and lectures about sound.
For more information please visit www.soundmeditation.com
Filmed by Jeremy Morris in 2015 and edited by James Reed in 2016.

[@jamesberlo4298]

Paiste's Symphonic Gong's are unbelievable , their capabilities .

[@jayisdreaming]

This video is a great informational guide for newly Gong players! Thanks Alexandre!

[@sandrinedandrea4922]

The best video regarding healing sound and the different mallets one can use. Very instructive and helpful. Thank you!

[@BradfordGuy]

You are a master of sound! So many people associate the gong with a powerful "blast" of sound and never realize the soft and moving range of different textures and tones. The harmonics that can be manipulated are incredible. I have heard the friction technique before, but not done nearly as beautiful and haunting as what you have done here. Magnificent! I could literally spend years learning all of the nuances of these instruments.

[@claudiad.-t.8418]

Hi, Everything is really clear and very helpful for the beginner that I am in playing gong. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge in such a beautiful way. Hope to listen to you again. Keep it up !

[@Playback007able]

Thank you! This was very insightful. I appreciate your years of research and study in the Sound healing field and am inspired to move forward in my own journey. By the way, I am not struck in any negative sense by your quasi displaying of your credentials through your free hair expression. It is endearing, actually, to see one being comfortable in their own hair.

[@lisacarlson2219]

Beautiful!!! I just fell in love with the gong even more. Thank you for this video

[@mariogongmario4767]

Thank you for sharing, Alexandre Tannous.

[@EPICMALLETS]

This was the first gong video I watched. Great introduction!

[@proyectopetisos]

Thank you very much for sharing! Beautiful

[@johannabernardy5923]

Great tutorial

[@shemoves]

A wonderful share of a vibrational journey....lovely

[@pilgrimage3660]

Wonderfully explained! Thank you

[@HairHotties]

Well, That Was Amazing!!!

[@vcaalnu34]

after hearing this my Chi energy is over 9000.

[@dharam108]

I'm enjoying your perspective

[@ruthhoey9978]

I love your explanations and you play so beautifully. thank you so much for sharing

[@joevallee1]

Nice playing! thank you for the tips

[@templehaze]

Great tips thank you!

[@saturndj788]

Beautiful technique

[@prima333]

Thank you!

[@tanjaashyanakosanovic3241]

Beautiful thank you

[@Danchell]

Giving the cosmos a voice.

[@motioninmind6015]

Very nice, thank you 😊

[@mooncradlestide]

I Love and appreciate this video!! I enjoy your teaching & playing style as well as the lovely sound healing. You are also very Beautiful with great hair : )

[@luzcastillo6425]

Thank youuuuuuuuuuuuu so much you are a great teacher

[@CampSwampy18]

This was tremendously helpful in learning about various mallets thank you for posting. What size is this gong? I'm interested in a Paiste symphonic gong. Thanks!

[@dvdny]

It's a Paiste 32" Symphonic, according to the caption.

[@giselleabadie6033]

Thank you for this informative study of sound, question for the friction mallets how do you play them without marking the gong? I have a variety of sizes but I ended up marking my gong which I quickly cleaned. I know some gong players don't mind markings on the gong but I just think there too beautiful to mark but please would love your perception! Thank you again!

[@marianoelflain1024]

Gracias!!

[@ParisLopezMarron]

Thanks a lot for sharing🙏🙏🙏 Really masterclass👌 Is it possible to create all those effects in a wind gong? Thanks in advance

[@raycatterick5641]

🙏✨

[@garyrobinson9514]

FRICTION MALLET. I am making this post in January 2024. The orchestra I play with is accompanying, in performance, its second Harry Potter film, “ Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.” Both this film score and the first call for “rub tam-tam,” or “tam-tam rubbed.” I now understand that the sound call for the next part is to be generated by a friction mallet across the surface of the tam-tam. Just discovering this post this morning and off to our first rehearsal, I plan to try various rubber mallets to see if this produces are desired effect. Hope this is some help to my fellow percussionists up there.

[@jfarres812]

thanks so much, very useful informations

[@micyeung]

What’s is the size of the gong that u are demonstrating? Thank you for your amazing video! It’s very informative.

[@rodrigobussad1414]

Hello! Did you buy or crafted those "superball" ? They are quite unique shape

[@fenorcity]

you , like so many other videos i have watched on this all show the same thing , your sitting there , after striking the gong and making such amazing tones/ frequencies , and then sit there perplexed ....... as you should be ......... you have no idea of the leap in tech you are looking / listening to when these gongs sing ..............

[@dvdny]

14:40 - I think my soul just left my body for a while there. Whoah. Thanks so much for this video, it's immensely informative. Can I ask which gong that is? update: I've watched a thousand 'gong' videos and this is still one of the most informative. Thanks so much for posting.

[@kathieplant8938]

It looks like a symphonic

[@dvdny]

@@kathieplant8938 Doh! I missed the part where he wrote 'Paiste 32" Symphonic' in the caption. Thanks.

[@kathieplant8938]

@@dvdny lol so did I. I just knew it was symphonic because I have one. Lol

[@dvdny]

@@kathieplant8938 I have a 36 wind. This one in a 32 will be next. Enjoy!

[@jeaninezimmert4451]

How are you doing the sound with only sliding and no „drumming“ ?

[@iemon7722]

Robert Plant is enjoying his retirement. Noice.

[@MurarichSiberian]

классно что где-то есть мир, в котором здоровый дяденька сидит и на полном серьезе рассказывает как разноцветными чупа-чупсами стукать в tam-tam. И это очень нужно ему и всем нам! но конечно смешно..

[@cecygarcia7237]

What is the diameter of this gong?

[@emanuel_soundtrack]

Why Orchestration books...

[@pikkshit]

What is that you use from 17:00 min? :)

[@animamundi6359]

It's called a flumie. This shape is called e-flumie.

[@amimoore7177]

Blackadder Blackadder

[@frankvanesch6372]

Doing

[@dxb8086]

_"Never crash a gong"_ Drummer and percussionist here, calling bullshit on that one.

[@ariobintangnugraha1916]

I legit thought that in the end of this video, this guy will persuade us to join some cult..

[@skylergoldstein715]

Anybody know a good GONG meditation video? **No binary beats, no narrator** Just a talented musician who takes you on a gong trip

[@solarlion144]

Your hair tho

[@I_leave_mean_comments]

HAHAHAHA what a goofball.

[@dandan9158]

I can not hear anything except ur talking. Put a mic near the gong, that's what we are here for

[@riccardofai8627]

sorry...nice but...WHY?? why teach something like this, for who, for what?? maybe everybody now can buy a gong and play, maybe everybody became a therapist now? my God. Please... there are too much easy master around the word, please stop it!

[@AlanSteinborn]

it is a valid worry, but in this case, it isn't about teaching others or being an overnight guru. Most people who play gongs never play them for others. So he is giving the basics for someone to go on their own sonic meditation without a master....

[@weaponizedautismofg.o.d.3490]

Quit crying.

[@erikadankeri]

Thank you, this was so helpful for my gong playing

[@songtreemusicandwellness]

Thank you!