Archive | Fred’s Samba
Fred’s Samba – Three with a hat
Partido Alto – Tams Fast & Slow
Partido Alto Caixa
Samba Breaks – Turn-arounds, Entries & Exits
Understanding the Samba Groove
by Pedro Batista (sourced online)
Samba’s most basic rhythm is a rolling 16th-note pattern, with four 16ths per beat. In musical notation it can be represented by
Fred’s Samba Five break
Enter on the whistle (no turn around). The band simply plays 1,2,3,4,5 and then shouts “OI!” Then straight back into Samba again.
Samba – Partido Alto- Agogo
Partido Alto bell pattern to play in Samba.
Enter on BOM BOM-BOM i.e join the rest of the band with 3 low bell hits (not played in video)

Mestre Fred – Nbr 3 Surdo Variations (We use in the S break)
In Bay Batucada the 3rd surdos play 2 and 3 part after the S-Break (On the leaders signal)
Full demonstration including hand signals in the video.
Samba Agogo (Freds SAmba)
Updated 18-04-2015 –This is the main pattern played through samba
Tamborim Entrada (Samba Entry)
New tam players will be wondering what the sequence of even beats (played by the Tams) at the start of Samba is all about. See the video below for an excellent explanation and demonstration of some entradas played by Tamborims.
Fred’s Samba – 3 break
Full demonstration including hand signals in the video.
Note Our re-entry after the 3 break is different from this vid i.e with Bay Batucada, the rest of the band reenters after the shaker shake down and repenique 1 bar fill
Fred’s Samba – Telescope Break
Another Samba break for our Samba demonstrated by Mestre Fred from London School of Samba.
This break is Tams vs the rest of the band. The “jah” vocalisation is the tamborims playing and the “bom” is the rest of the band playing.
Mestre Fred Vocalises Samba Intro
A great vid of the whole samba intro vocalised. This is an entry from the London School of Samba. Learn to vocalise this yourself as a great training exercise for vocalisation.
Samba Chocalho – Standard Pattern
Samba Teceira (3rd) Surdo Entry into Samba
In this reference clip from Monobloco, you can listen to your entry and push into Samba. Starts from the 0.35 second mark. Its exactly the same as how we do it. After that, its not the pattern you play in Samba, however enjoy listening to it and hearing a few 3rd surdo variations thrown in along the way.
Funk Caixa for the funk in Fred’s Samba
(This is Caixa for the funk part played in samba. It is the pattern previously played in “Funk 2”)
Continue Reading →
Tamborims for the funk part played in Fred’s Samba
(Previously the pattern for “funk 2”)
Played slower here than you will hear in the audio files of the other instruments.
Samba Caixa – Basic Pattern
This is essential viewing for any new Caixa player. Having a caixa section playing proper Samba swing is an integral part of the Samba sound. If you are a new Samba player, mastering the pattern that you will see here will be one of your main focuses.
Samba Teceira (3rd) Surdo Basic Pattern – Learn First
Use this video as an example of the basic 3rd surdo pattern for Samba. (What you play in Fred’s Samba)
From 0 to.44 shows the basic pattern for a nbr 3 surdo.
The rest of the video looks at some variations.

