20 Years after Africa

My account of the trip that changed me forever

July 7-August 1991

I literally kissed the ground when I got off the plane in Dakar, Senegal. So many months of saving money, planning details and wild expectations had finally come to fruition. As a drummer, I had come to believe that Africa would take me down a rhythmic ride that would propel me into a new sense of belonging, a new sense of understanding. I was not to be disappointed. Everything about that day seemed new: the smell of the air, the flies, the colorful dress, the lines of beggars at the airport, the languages, and the people themselves. I was overcome with excitement. Why had I come to Africa?

I’m not sure what I expected but the experience was certainly different. Dakar was a modern city. Any images of people in the bush in loin clothes had been created by TV or some other stereotype. But there were more important discoveries. These people lived with passion. Many had music of in their daily lives, in the communities’ right where they lived. This was the most beautiful thing that I saw. Weekly, on Sunday afternoon, each neighborhood (every two or three streets) would have a kids dance on the street. A group of Sabar drummers would line up and the mothers would usher up their children 5-10 at time. They would dance for a minute or two and then a new group would come up. This would go on all afternoon. Then they would take a dinner break. A night the adults would return, dressed in their Sunday finest. They would then dance, sing and play in the same manner till late in the evening. To this day it was some the most amazing music that I have ever heard. Sabar is a family of traditional drums found in Senegal, played with one hand and one stick. They are quite loud and can be heard over long distances, thus their use of communicating between villages.

I saw many other things – a pink lake, with such heavy amounts of salt in the water that men would be covered when they came out of the lake. Large piles waited nearby for the trains to carry the salt away. Nearby was an herbal hospital. They treated everything from lepers to Aids. Our tour there was lead by a doctor with a lot of hope even in such a sad place.

Hope was big on the agenda. Everywhere I went, even in the poorest places, people would smile at you like you were their long lost relative. You could literally walk into the front door of someone’s hut and they would greet you like they had been waiting all day to see you. Most of the time, they would invite you to dinner as well. At the time, I was a vegetarian. However, when a family would have me over for dinner, I would eat whatever they served. You see, they had gone to market that morning, many miles away. They would buy food at great expense for their budget and prepare it all afternoon. Then they have me as a guest and serve it in the evening. I would have offended them had I not eaten what they offered. Meat was a luxury and they had gone to great effort to provide it. I got over myself and eat with thankfulness.

The music was why I really wanted to go. At every turn, I heard or saw things that stretched my mind and stirred my emotions. There was the Fulani trope with 50 yards of cloth in each pair of pants. They played hypnotizing, flute music with an incessant rhythm played on gourds. There was the fire eater who also could run fire over his entire body without getting burned. The Fulani music in the background added to the suspense. There were the contortionists; some people were brought out in trunks, accompanied by bougarabou drums, a set of elongated goblet, on a stand, played in sets of 3-5 drums. They are very tonal in nature. A man in a small trunk would slowly unwind out of it. How did he ever fit in a space so small!

A few times I saw Katiero drummers. 3 different sized drums, also played with one hand and one stick like Sabar drums. These were smaller elongated drums that are carried and much lighter than Saber, thus quieter. Beautiful, intricate rhythms with the lilting sound of rhythms done with a stick and hand. They were accompanied with dancing and singing. It was one of many small afternoon parties where the musicians were bathed in money. They would put bills on their foreheads, shoulders and arms while the musicians where playing. We should try that here in the US! Unfortunately, you rarely see these types of drums here and I think they are getting even rarer in West Africa.

Why don’t we see them and other drums here in the US? As one friend put it, now it’s all about the djembe! Even though the djembe didn’t originate in Senegal or The Gambia, it is still a huge part of the culture. These are different than most other drums in Africa. One primary difference is the high tension rope tuning system. These heads are tighter than drums with a less complex tuning system. These drums speak loud, with passion. They can be heard far away, especially on a moonless night, in a land where there are few street lights and you are left to ponder there significance in the darkness. They could know your name in the next village before you get there from the language of the drum. Fire, passion, energy with the joy of dance and song – that is what the djembe is about.

So the djembe is where my love affair with African drumming started in 1987. When I walked into a Chuck Davis class at Watts Street School one evening, the sound of the drums hit me – hard! I had to learn this music. I had to learn this drum. At that time, I had a master’s degree in percussion. At the moment that I heard those drummers, I felt that I wasn’t a master of anything. So my education started all over again with Djembefola Khalid Saleem. He started me like a beginner and slowly, thoroughly guided me through the rhythm patterns that are the core of West African rhythms. I also learned dun-dun, congas and shekere. I learned how to feel the music. That is the most important part and it can only be learned by doing and listening – over and over again!

By the time I got to Africa, I felt that I knew just enough to understand what was being taught to me there. Without Khalid, the trip, my life, everything, would have gone right over my head.

What Khalid gave to me was not only djembe lessons but a way to live my life. Peace and Blessings are in his every greeting. And so it became with me. My life’s work must embrace peace and the blessings that we receive everyday we are on the planet. All along with the music and rhythm that makes me know I am alive! I think the creator everyday for the blessings of this teaching.

I am so thankful for that day that heard those drums. There would have been no trip to Africa, no break from traditional percussion, no wonderful meeting the hundreds of people that I have meet through the drum, no Khalid, a very different journey on this planet. In short, my life would have been drastically different – and incomplete!

20 years ago changed my life in ways that are impossible to explain. May we all just keep following the rhythm of our heart and I am sure it lead to place where we belong. Yes, I’m sure.

In shaa'Allah,

Jim Roberts

Summit to Shore: Ocrafolk Festival – Saturday’s Performers on the Howard Street Stage

Summit to Shore: Ocrafolk Festival – Saturday’s Performers on the Howard Street Stage

Craicdown Facebook Page is up!

My band Craicdown has it's Facebook page up! Take a look~



If you friend me it makes it easier for me to keep in touch with you!!

NEW CRAICDOWN CD!!

Here is the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year, the heart of the spring and summer. The big news is that my trio, Craicdown, has it's new CD in hand! The official release is scheduled Sunday, October 24! We will have a party and festivities at a place announced later. This labor of love was 2 years in the making and we hope it worth the wait.

The band consists of Rob Sharer on string and wind instruments. He also sings, writes and jumps from tall buildings (or small walls). David DiGiuseppe plays accordion and cittern and he writes as well. I play percussion like a drum set and drum set like percussion. See if you can follow that one.

The music isn’t easily pigeonholed but imagine if the Duhks met the Bryds and flew around the world together! – that could be us more or less without the harmony singing and the 12 string electric! Three diverse musicians following their own “Roads” finally converge in a place called CRAICDOWN (crack-down) meaning a good time or party. Party with purpose and make some serious music while you’re at it!

You won’t have to wait till October to get it as it is up on CD Baby!
Check it out at cdbaby.com/craicdown You can download it or get the CD.

More soon!

Welcome Students!

Welcome to Jim Roberts Percussion! So you want to learn drum set, hand drums, beginning piano, guitar or vocals? Or maybe you're a band or orchestra student who wants to learn traditional percussion (mallets, snare drum, timpani). Either way - You've come to the right place!

I've been teaching performing and producing for over 20 years. Because my interests are varied, I have a lot of different "musical wells" to draw upon, from music of the world to the music of the America. They include all types of current styles including Alternative, Pop, Hip and Hop, and Latin to Folk, African, Cuban, Brazilian, Rock, Country, Classical, Jazz and others. Presently, I teach music at Elon University. I am also a gigging musician with lots of real world experience in most contemporary styles as well as world music. For me that includes congas, djembe, dun-dun, dumbek, various frame drums and singing. If you are a vocalist, I can help you too. I ran a studio in Nashville, TN and produced dozens of vocal sessions for records and demos. As a producer, I have produced over 15 albums. I also play many different instruments and arrange songs and compositions. Let me know if you're trying to do a record and I will do a consultation session for you.

So, the odds are - I can help you be a better musician, no matter what you want to study. If you are already an artist or have a band, I can help you make that record with great production.

What can't I do? Bungee jumping, Mountain climbing, Cave diving or Bull Riding is in the list. Hopefully though, I can help you reach your goal as a musician. Give me a call to set your lesson today.

Peace and Blessings - JIM
919-259-1956 C

Kalimba Studio Relocated - A new life in Chapel Hill, NC

Please excuse the long absence to this blog. I promise to try to be more regular in the future. Since November of 2006, I have relocated the studio to Chapel Hill, NC. Here I have set up a small production "Kalimba" room where I compose, mix, do overdubs and rehearse. Even though I don't have the "big room" as in Nashville, I have a great space for getting music recorded and put out. I have all my mikes, preamps, percussion, marimba, keyboard and midi setup (Ableton Live, Nuendo, etc). I am also able to record percussion on your project no matter where you live! Its easy. Just send an MP3 to me with a rough mix of your track. I will do the percussion and FTP the rendered files back to you (wav or aiff 24 wave files). I've even done a session with someone from South Africa - no problem!

New things are happening in my life. I am actually touring more now that I am out of Nashville. In the past year and a half, I've done gigs in Michigan, California, Florida, DC, Philly, Maine, New York, Virginia and more. Many of these are contra dance weekends and tours. So I can travel wherever your gig is at.

I have also been doing music editing work for Top Talent Media and Epic Soul of Nashville. I helped convert his entire music library to usable bits of media. I also composed percussion tracks for TV which are available at Sonic Librarian in LA.

Most recently, I have started teaching percussion at Elon University near Burlington, NC.I have 15 students. Their studies include marimba, timpani, snare drum, multi-percussion, and djembe. I also have private students outside of the school. For the winter term (January), I will be teaching a class 5 days a week called: Woodstock, Hippies and other Enduring Legacies: The Music of the 60's and 70's. Everything from the Beatles to the Police.

In the spring term I will be teaching a world music ensemble in addition to private students. It will be a 4 semester hour course.

From Oct 3-10, I was involved in a Jose Rivera play called, Marisol. It involved creating an improvised score using percussion, keyboards and voice. I also used a Roland Handsonic, a Roland SPD sampler and a Boss RC-50 loop station. It was a great experience as the play lent itself to dynamic and dramatic soundscapes.

In addition to adding more teaching as of late, I began teaching a Beginning Hand Drum Techniques class at the Music Explorium in Durham, NC. It is a 6 week class, once a week and there are 12 students. I will continue teaching classes starting in January. Contact the Music Explorium in Durham for more information.
www.musicexplorium.com

You can now sign up for my myspace page if you like. It is www.myspace.com/jimrobertspercussion
Thanks for dropping by and do send me a line!
jim@jimrobertspercussion.com

"PAPARAZZI" Nominated for 2006 "Just Plain Folks Music Awards"!

2006 Just Plain Folks Music Awards Nominations

The Just Plain Folks Music Organization has officially announced the nominees for its 2006 Just Plain Folks Music Awards. After receiving over 25,500 albums and 350,000 songs from 105 countries, Nominations for Best Song in 67 Genres and Best Album in 81 categories have been posted. In addition, we have posted this year's Lyric and Video Nominees. All nominations are posted on the Just Plain Folks website found at www.JPFolks.com. The winners will be announced at the Just Plain Folks Music Awards Show on November 4th, 2006 in Santa Ana, CA at the Galaxy Theater.

World Song Nominee:
Paparazzi by Jim Roberts on ANCIENT HAND Tranze is the Danze Trk-6 TN

Purchase at:
http://cdbaby.com/cd/ancienthand

Fall Schedule and Beyond

August 12 - 13 Elkin Brown (Kalimba Studio)
August 14 - 24 Cady Finlayson (Kalimba Studio)
August 26 FunkFest Indiana (Victor Wooten Festival)
September 29 Footloose TCD Dance Chapel Hill, NC
September 30 Footloose Shepherdstown, W.VA
October Baltimore Rhythm Festival TBA
October 1 Footloose Glen Echo, Maryland
October 26 Footloose Old Farmers Ball, Swannanoa, NC
October 27 Footloose Atlanta, GA
October 28 Footloose Monster Mash Table Rock, SC
October 28 Footloose Evening Dance Table Rock, SC

January 26-28 Footloose Snow Ball, Tampa FL
March 29 Footloose Old Farmers Ball, Swannanoa, NC
March 30-April 1 Footloose Chattanooga, TN
April 2 Footloose Knoxville, TN
April 27-29 Footloose Spring Dance Romance, Hanging Rock, NC

ADF/American Dance and Music/Footloose Tour

American Dance Festival
For 3 weeks in June, I was located in Durham, NC as an accompanist for the dance festival. This festival lasts for a total of 6 weeks and is a combination of dance classes during the day by renown national and international dancers. In the evening, concerts were presented, two different troupes a week. Some of the companies included in the first three weeks were Paul Taylor, David Dorfman, Pilobolus, and Rhythm Suites: Kathak and Tap Dance featuring Pandit Chitresh Das and tap star Jason Samuels. In the last 70 years the festival premiered more than 570 dance works, many of them landmark dances commissioned by the ADF. Today, they are continuing their tradition of discovering, commissioning, and bringing recognition to many of moderns dance's finest talents. It was a great honor for me to join the facility for the first half of the season.

My job was primarily to accompany the classes during the day. There are 10 or so accompanists and our classes rotate weekly, varying between 2 and 3, two hour classes per day. I accompanied for David Dorfman, Lisa Race, Ursala Pane (formally of the Urban Bush Women), Keith Thompson, Ming-Lung Yang and Tatiana Baganova (Provincial Dances Theatre [Russia]). I also taught a one time music class for dancers on counting and breaks in dance. It was a rewarding and challenging experience and pressed me to come up with a barrage of musical ideas to keep the classes flowing. This was invigorating to me and I enjoyed the challenge. Starting in the third week, most classes were in the fairly repressive Durham heat. A good incentive to work hard and sweat a lot!

One highlight included Musicians Concert (June 21), the only event with no dance. Personally, this was a high point for me. I was able to premier a piece called "Gift", a tribute to Martha Graham, one the originators of ADF in 1936 in Bennington, VT. Her famous quote, "There is a vitality, a quickening, a life-force…"served as the inspiration for the piece and now one the pieces to add to a solo percussion show that I have been working toward. I used the quote as a speech, multi music media piece. It went over quite well and I now just have to continue tweaking it for future performances. I also performed in a Cuban ensemble with Vladimir Espinosa. This was a mix of traditional religious music and secular folkloric pieces. Also, in this ensemble an old friend, Bradley Simmons and an ex-student, Justin Hill. Next came the ensemble with Khalid Saleem. Another reunion of old drumming buddies and great time as we played a rhythm called DunDunBa. What a highlight for the summer. We closed the night with a jam with John Hanks, group with Willie Painter, Greg Dittmar and ADF musician, Jefferson Dalby. A good time was had by all, especially when the ADF students started break dancing in the middle of Baldwin Auditorium.

Another highlight included performing in the concert honoring Chuck Davis, the receipt of the 2006 The Balasaraswati/Joy Ann Dewy Beinecke Endowed Chair for Distinguished Teaching. This Chair pays tribute to teachers who have shaped and preserved modern dance across generations. During the early 1990's, I was performed with Chuck Davis African - American Dance Ensemble under the music direction of my teacher, Khalid Saleem. It was of great honor and pleasure to reunite with my old teacher and play traditional West African music again with Chuck and many of the former members of AADE. After living in Nashville for 10 years, I can't adequately describe feeling of joy and love during these moments. I am certainly a blessed man and I remember why I signed up for this crazy life as a musician - for moments like these.


Footloose Tour/American Dance and Music Week
The reason that I didn't spend the entire season at the ADF was my gigs with the Chapel Hill band, Footloose. On July 1st, I flew CA and started working the first week for American Dance and Music Week which is organized by the Bay Area Country Dance Society. It was located at the Mendocino Woodlands in the coastal Redwoods of Northern California. Besides Footloose, the other musicians included KGB, Mary Lea and Jim Oakden. It was also a real pleasure to work with caller, George Marshall of Wild Asparagus, Cis Hinkle and renowned dance historian, Richard Powers.

This state park was an incredible divergence from the NC heat. It was so beautiful there and the folks that put it on are real jewels. It was a great week of music, contra dancing and just plain fun. This crowd loved to laugh and create interesting pastimes. I taught a drum class for the week to a very enthusiastic group of students. On my night off, went into Mendocino and witnessed one of the most gorgeous sunsets I have ever seen off the cliffs over the Pacific. The colors just lingered and lingered on for what seemed forever. Then a fine outdoor meal of Pacific Halibut and California wine. Wow, what a week.

On Saturday, July 8, we left the camp to begin our tour of contra dances and house concerts. The tour included Palo Alto, Monterey, Santa Cruz, Los Angeles, and San Diego. We say some old friends, made new ones and the band seemed to be a hit everywhere we played. Footloose is a 4 piece band made up of my old friend, David DiGiuseppe, on accordion, John Davidson, a Scottish fiddler that I discovered on a bulletin board in a Nashville coffee shop, and Pete Campbell, a pianist the I have known and played with for many years. For this gig, I am playing a box called a Cajon which serves the function of a drum set for acoustic situations. It works well for this set-up and I add things like Djembe, Congas, Snare, Cymbals and various percussion instruments. It's also a easy set up that works well for airplane dates. I rent the bigger stuff if needed and carry the basic gear.

Several tour highlights - concerts in a club in Pasadena and in Santa Cruz offered a chance to do some additional songs and other non contra dance music. This band has really started to jell and is coming into it's own. It was a pleasure to be able to feature the Cajon as an artful instrument and to explore the rhythmic and tonal aspects of it.

In addition, the food in CA was amazing. Such fresh fruit and vegetables. I felt very healthy after the trip was over.

The last night we played in Santa Barber. It was an incredible hall that you could adjust the amount of tension in the floor! Also, afterwards, we stayed in a house on the top of the hills overlooking Santa Barber and the site was breathtaking. You could see the ocean as well as all of Santa Barber lit you below. On the drive on the windy road up, we passed Oprah's CA house but of didn't have time to stop and say hello - ha. California is an amazing place and I really love it every time I get to visit.