Last night we delivered our first independent ‘Solo for the terrified’ workshop outside the festival circuit. The idea and title of this style of workshop was coined by the organisers of African Beats Camp festival; since then we’ve been leading them at the drumming festivals for the last few years. Observing how successful and popular they have been, and having received excellent feedback from many people who have participated; it is clear that djembe players and aspiring soloists all over the place could potentially benefit from these workshops.
Having decided to run our own class, we chose our regular venue of The Royal Oak pub in Chorlton for its friendly, helpful staff, confortable function room with excellent acoustics. With only a rough idea of who and how many people might attend, we were pleased with a good turnout of twenty odd people, the majority of whom can from outside Manchester. The session went really well with the initial nervous energy in the room being slowly broken down as all participants faced their fear, stepped into their power and eventually, fuelled by encouragement and cheering on from the rest of the group, produced part taught, part improvised djembe solos, including ‘en chauffements’, call outs and djembe to dundun interactions.
We all enjoyed the workshop massively and are extremely pleased with how much all the other participants seemed to enjoy themselves and benefit from it too.
Big thanks to all them attended, our friends Maire and the Kontaani group who turned up on mass, and an extra big thank you to Jonny Hodgkinson and Sebastian Labays for supporting on the dunduns and helping holding it all together.
Our next ‘one off’ workshop will be an ‘Advanced African Drumming Workshop’ in the same place on Thursday 1st September. Keep an eye on the workshops page for more special drumming workshops coming soon.
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3 responses
Last night seven Kontaani members attended the ‘soloing for the terrified’ workshop run by Drumroots in Manchester.
What a fabulous evening!
Although most of us WERE actually terrified the wonderful, supportive and sympathetic tuition from Jamie and Beej (supported by Johnny and Seb) created an atmosphere condusive to allowing us all to ‘have a go’ without fear of making a fool of ourselves. This is an area, thought of by most of us, as only worthy of ‘djembefolas’ and very advanced players – not so, with the expert guidence and tried and tested techniques explained in an easily understood way everyone in the room began to SOLO!
The energy and euphoria in the room at the end of the night was explosive, everyone supporting and cheering for each person in turn.
I for one, learnt so much and as always happens at Drumroots workshops I made new friends – thank you Drumroots – we’ll be back!
Marie and the Kontaani drummers xxx
Top quality event with insightful teaching and lots willing participants. Big smiles all round :-))
Lots of stuff started to make sense and drifting off into an occasional solo bit doesn’t seem so impossible now. Well done to you both and the dundun team.
Our from Leeds were well buzzing on the way back too (as younger people might say!)
Can’t wait for the next Drumroots sesh
—
D
So the big soloing mystery of life is unveiled at last. I wish I knew this before so my group wouldn’t have had to have a go at me for so long for refusing to solo!
The workshop was excellent and taught in such a way that nerves began to ease as it went on, and the encouragement from the other people there and the Drumroots team was great. The venue is really good – plenty of space, easy to get to and local for me. I’d missed this workshop at ABC and very pleased that one was held on my doorstep!
Thanks to everyone, great teaching style and excellent support from the dun players.
Looking forward to getting to “advanced soloing for the over-confident”
Gill 🙂