Iranian Music: Daf
The daf (Persian: دف), also known as dâyere or riq, is a traditional Iranian frame drum used in both popular and classical music. It is widely played across Persian-influenced regions of South and Central Asia, including Iran, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, parts of Georgia and Armenia, Pakistan, and areas of India.
The daf is the other of Iran’s indigenous drums – the other is the donbak which I've already talked about elsewhere.
As you can see from the picture, the daf is a wide, circular, frame drum. Inside the frame of the drum are hundreds of metal rings in short chains. The player beats the drum with his fingers while supporting it in his palms.
With the movement and beating of the daf, the rings inside the frame strike the skin – the same way as the springs of a snare drum work. The sound is a combination between a bass boom caused by the hand and a high-pitched crash from the rings. The daf is a drum for dancing to. Indeed, it is the drum to which Sufi mystics dance the whirling, trance-inducing dance known as sama.
