[Dixielandjazz] Washboards - what and where?

[Luís Henriques]

Hi everybody,

In the band I am leading, we are currently using drums in the rhythmic
section.  However, we are thinking about start using a washboard (and,
probably, get rid of the drums!).  The problem is: we are in Portugal
and nobody seems to know what that is!  I searched in the Internet but,
as I do not know nothing about the subject it didn't helped a lot.

Could someone give me some suggestions?  It would be great to have:

 * Some advice on buying the instrument - we will use it both in
   concerts and in parades
 * Some links/contacts to companies/people that build washboards;
 * What are the needed accessories (for example, what is the name of
   those "things" to put on the fingers?)

Hope there are a lot of washboard players in this list to help me on
this :)

Thanks a lot.

-- 
Luís Henriques