The cup game is a children's clapping game that involves tapping and hitting a cup using a defined rhythm. The game can be played by many players seated around a table and is often played in large groups. Each player possesses a cup and in unison the players tap out the defined rhythm using their cups. It can be played competitively, where the rhythm speeds up in each "round", and a player making a mistake in the rhythm must drop out of the game, with a new "round" starting after each elimination, and game play continuing until only one player remains, with that player being the winner.
The cup game begins with a cup placed upside down in front of each player. Assuming a right-handed player, the rhythm normally proceeds as follows:
Repeat the above sequence indefinitely until a mistake is made by a player, such as being off-beat, knocking the cup over, missing a step, etc. Some versions involve variations where the players exchange cups during the performance of the rhythm, or players slap hands with each other. [1]
In the Lulu and the Lampshades (and newer) performances, this is the right hand which slaps down flat onto the table.
Repeat the above sequence indefinitely.
Christian singer Rich Mullins used the cup game to accompany his song "Screen Door" on his 1987 album Pictures in the Sky . [2] It was used by Palavra Cantada (Paulo Tatit & Sandra Peres) in 1998 with the song "Fome Come" from their album "Canções Curiosas". [3] In 2009 the band Lulu and the Lampshades used the game in their performance of the 1931 Carter Family song "When I'm Gone" as modified to suit the game by "Lulu" (Luisa Gerstein). Rapper P.O.S also uses the cup game in "Optimist (We Are Not for Them)" from his 2009 album Never Better. In 2011 the cup game was again used by Anna Burden to accompany the song "When I'm Gone" in a YouTube video that went viral. Anna Kendrick taught herself to copy Burden's video, and this was worked into her performance in the 2012 film Pitch Perfect , her version "Cups (When I'm Gone)" in turn becoming widely copied with a 2013 video after the single from the soundtrack rose on the national and international charts. [4]
There are older cup games as well, with rhythmic moving and passing of cups. Often there is a particular place in the rhythm where the passing is different, faster, or more difficult, and missing this pass puts a player "out", a new "round" beginning with each elimination, and the last player winning.
One such game is called "Acitrón de un fandango" (or various alternate spelling), and is said to originate in Mexico. [5]
The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though some variants may not have a head. Tambourines are often used with regular percussion sets. They can be mounted, for example on a stand as part of a drum kit, or they can be held in the hand and played by tapping, hitting, or shaking the instrument.
The washboard and frottoir are used as a percussion instrument, employing the ribbed metal surface of the cleaning device as a rhythm instrument. As traditionally used in jazz, zydeco, skiffle, jug band, and old-time music, the washboard remained in its wooden frame and is played primarily by tapping, but also scraping the washboard with thimbles. Often the washboard has additional traps, such as a wood block, a cowbell, and even small cymbals.
Clawhammer, sometimes called down-picking, overhand, or most commonly known as frailing, is a distinctive banjo playing style and a common component of American old-time music. The style likely descends from that of West African lutes, such as the akonting which are also the direct ancestors of the banjo.
In music and music theory, the beat is the basic unit of time, the pulse, of the mensural level. The beat is often defined as the rhythm listeners would tap their toes to when listening to a piece of music, or the numbers a musician counts while performing, though in practice this may be technically incorrect. In popular use, beat can refer to a variety of related concepts, including pulse, tempo, meter, specific rhythms, and groove.
The Optigan is an electronic keyboard instrument designed for the consumer market. The name stems from the instrument's reliance on pre-recorded optical soundtracks to reproduce sound. Later versions were sold under the name Orchestron.
The conga, also known as tumbadora, is a tall, narrow, single-headed drum from Cuba. Congas are staved like barrels and classified into three types: quinto, tres dos or tres golpes (middle), and tumba or salidor (lowest). Congas were originally used in Afro-Cuban music genres such as conga and rumba, where each drummer would play a single drum. Following numerous innovations in conga drumming and construction during the mid-20th century, as well as its internationalization, it became increasingly common for drummers to play two or three drums. Congas have become a popular instrument in many forms of Latin music such as son, descarga, Afro-Cuban jazz, salsa, songo, merengue and Latin rock.
Bemani, stylized as BEMANI, is Konami's music video game division. Originally named the Games & Music Division (G.M.D.), it changed its name in honor of its first and most successful game, Beatmania, and expanded into other music-based games, most notably rhythm games such as Dance Dance Revolution, GuitarFreaks, and DrumMania.
A clap is the percussive sound made by striking together two flat surfaces, as in the body parts of humans or animals. Humans clap with the palms of their hands, often quickly and repeatedly to express appreciation or approval, but also in rhythm as a form of body percussion to match the sounds in music, dance, chants, hand games, and clapping games.
Zills or zils, also called finger cymbals, are small metallic cymbals used in belly dancing and similar performances. They are called sāgāt in Egypt. They are similar to Tibetan tingsha bells. In Western music, several pairs can be set in a frame to make a tambourine.
"Mary Mack" is a clapping game of unknown origin. It is first attested in the book The Counting Out Rhymes of Children by Henry Carrington Bolton (1888), whose version was collected in West Chester, Pennsylvania. It is well known in various parts of the United States, Australia, Canada, United Kingdom and in New Zealand and has been called "the most common hand-clapping game in the English-speaking world".
Assyrian folk dances are sets of dances that are performed throughout the world by Assyrians, mostly on occasions such as weddings, community parties and other jubilant events.
A flamenco guitar is a guitar similar to a classical guitar, but with lower action, thinner tops and less internal bracing. It usually has nylon strings, like the classical guitar, but it generally possesses a livelier, more gritty sound compared to the classical guitar. It is used in toque, the guitar-playing part of the art of flamenco.
"Stella Ella Ola", also known as "Quack Dilly Oso", is a clapping game where players stand or sit in a circle placing one hand over their neighbour's closer hand and sing the song. On every beat, a person claps their higher hand onto the touching person's palm. The cycle continues until the song ends at which point if the person's hand is slapped, they are considered "out" and must stand or sit in the center of the circle, or leave the circle and watch this from the edges.
Tap dance makes frequent use of syncopation. Tap dance choreographies typically start on the eighth beat, or between the eighth and the first count.
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Body percussion may be performed on its own or as an accompaniment to music and/or dance. Examples of countries' folk traditions that incorporate body percussion include Indonesian saman, Ethiopian armpit music, palmas in flamenco, and the hambone from the United States. Body percussion is a subset of "body music".
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The krap is a Southeast Asian musical percussion instrument (clapper) used in Cambodia and Thai for percussion. The krap, made of bamboo, wood and metal, are used for dance rhythms and for song.
"When I'm Gone" also commonly known by its longer title "You're Gonna Miss Me When I'm Gone", is a popular song written by A. P. Carter and was recorded in 1931 by the Carter Family.