The base keeps fundamental for any musical event. The mighty drums lay out the thorough rhythmical ground, on which creative soloists realize their top performance. The peoples of the Mande and Bambara in Mali and Guinea, who use the jembe as their hand-drum, play the base in sets of three. Each drummer plays one base drum right-handed with a stick, the left hand beats a bell fixed on the drum.

The smallest base drum is called kenkene (kenkede); the biggest and deepest-sounding drum is named doundoun, doundounba or djung. One musician can play these two if necessary. The medium-sized base drum, the sangpan, accentuates and is often played "off-beat" by one person only. The bodies of the drums are turned out of the lathe, made as cooper work or carved out of hollow trees. They are covered with thick cow skin.

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