A Masai violinist leads a 'kidumbak' ensemble at a party on a sandbank off the shores of Zanzibar.

The kidumbak ensemble consists of a single melodic instrument, customarily a violin (played in frantic fiddle-style), a sanduku, or tea-chest-bass, two small clay drums (ki-dumbak), which form the rhythmic core of every such ensemble and other rhythm instruments, such as cherewa, a kind of maracas manufactured from coconut shells filled with seeds or mkwasa, short wooden sticks, played like claves. In contrast to taarab, kidumbak is much more rhythmic and the lyrics more drastic than the poetic settings of the taarab songs, often criticizing other peoples social behaviour. At wedding performances the singer has to be able to string together a well-timed medley of ngoma songs, and have the ability to compose lyrics on the spot. At a Zanzibar wedding, one kidumbak set usually lasts for an hour and as one song joins the next, the intensity heats up, with the main attraction being the interplay between the players and the dancing and chorus response by the wedding guests.