[Thanks to Joaoclima for the photo, rollover for credits.]

I was frustrated with my pandeiro practice a few months ago, because I felt like I had enough practice to keep up with and play along with some slower sambas / pagoda tunes - but my playing didn't sound right, it didn't "fit" the music.

My pandeiro teacher had always stressed the active use of the left hand - in particular to bring the pandeiro to meet the right hand when playing. To be clear - this is true, and is not the problem.

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p>I was originally going to write about Mitoka Samba's eponymous album that I downloaded from the US Amazon site. Except now, as a France-based referrer, I can't point you to it.  :-(  However, I found a compliation album which features Mitoka Samba and a few other artists as well - doing some interesting recomposing of songs in percussion arrangements.  Enjoy with my original notes on Mitoka Samba below....