Where the Güiro Comes From

The origin of the modern güiro is a bit uncertain. There are accounts of güiro-like instruments made from hollowed-out gourds or animal bones that can be traced to South America and the Caribbean, as well as to regions of West and Central Africa. Today you hear the güiro in many kinds of music across Central and South America. It's most commonly made of a hollowed-out gourd, plastic or fiberglass, with ridges and grooves of different sizes. The one in the video is LP's Super Güiro, with a durable plastic stick.

How to Hold It

I use my index and ring finger in the two rubber-ringed holes in the back, and I hold the instrument at a bit of an angle so both wrists stay in a comfortable position. But feel free to play around and see what feels good to you. The same goes for the stick: I tend to place my index finger a bit further up, but you'll see some players use a more standard fulcrum.

The Down Stroke and the Up Stroke

The first two sounds are a down stroke, where you brush over just a couple of the ridges with a downward motion while striking roughly in the middle, and an up stroke, where you do the same thing moving upward, again striking near the güiro's vertical center. When you start combining them, focus on staying loose and turning your wrist slightly in a sweeping motion, aiming for short, accented strokes.

The Scrape

The last sound, and the one most associated with the güiro, is the scrape. There are a bunch of ways to produce it. The most common way in Afro-Cuban styles like the cha-cha-cha is a combined down-and-up motion that scrapes only a couple of ridges on the way down and hits a few more on the way up.

In the video I show it slowly as two separate motions first, then a bit faster, aiming for one fluid sound and motion. The motion can take some time to get used to, so work on it slowly and stay relaxed.

Putting It Together: The Fundamental Pattern

With the three sounds, you can play the fundamental güiro pattern: an up-down scrape, followed by a short down stroke and a short up stroke. At a slow tempo it can be tricky to get a consistent, fluid sound from the scrape, but as you pick up speed you start to hear it as one stroke.

As you speed up, I often move the güiro itself slightly, in tandem with the stick, to stay in a better flow and stay relaxed.

How to Practice

As simple as it is, this pattern can act as the rhythmic glue of the percussion section: it takes up some of the higher-end frequencies and helps things swing.

1. Work on each sound slowly first: the down stroke, then the up stroke, then the scrape as two separate motions.
2. Combine them into one fluid scrape, staying relaxed.
3. Play the fundamental pattern slowly, then speed it up a little at a time.
4. Then play along with a loop.

Quick Answers