One and two and one and two two; one and two and one and two two
One and two and one and two two; one and two and one and two two...
The other day somebody sent me a YouTube link to a TED talk by Evelyn Glennie, one of the world's most eminent percussionists who is also profoundly deaf, about the art of listening and the way in which we connect with the sound colours of the people around us.
Then I went out in the car; on the radio the conductor Simon Rattle
was talking about his very first drum kit.
Then I was sitting in the pub talking to my friend Cindy and a man walked past the window carrying a tomtom and a snare drum.
Today there's drumming in the air.
But always there's clapping and tapping,
the rhythmic babble of conversation,
the thump of things.
DRUM is the word
the bowl of the U covered with a vibrating
Mmmmmmmembrane on which one DRops
a hand or stick
I’ve been a drummer
for as long as I can remember
a tip tapper from the very beginning.
As a small child I used to construct drum kits
of saucepans and Tupperware,
tins of coffee with plastic tops, saucepan lid cymbals.
I'd forgotten all that until I heard today
Ringo himself on the radio
saying he did the same.
Before I had a drum kit I had my own pop group,
led by a man called Ramuel Groovit.
I imagined him, named him, drew him,
designed the sleeve of the concept album,
even wrote the lyrics to songs with no tunes
for a pretend pop group called The IF.
Ramuel sang and played keyboards.
There was a big tall bass player whose name I can’t remember,
which is sad because I was his creator,
the only person for whom he existed.
My first drum kit was second hand and beaten up, but I could hardly believe
it was possible to be given something so wonderful.
I still think like that about the gift of drums.
Best was the bass drum to which I glued
that poster of Che.I played
brilliant, virtuoso drum solos for hours and hours.
At least that's how I remember it.
Eskimos settle all disagreements
through drumming contests called Trommesang
the clan gathers in festive mood,
the two contestants drum and sing their accusations
which can be true or imaginary, vicious or satirical,
the group decides whose won and peace returns.
They deal this way with robbery, murder...
and if there's been no crime committed
they just do it for fun.
To play the tabla you must understand Tal: a framework in time.
The particular arrangement of audible sounds and silence
is what defines the unique character of each Tal.
The tabla drums are used to maintain the flow
of Tal in music and dance.
The technical term for this manifestation
of Tal on a drum is theka.
This is Alla Rakha who played tabla with Ravi Shankar and died in 2000.
In my teens I played bongos with my friends Keef and John;
we were called Edge of August.
We produced a magazine together
and played gigs where we read our poetry in between songs
In those days I spent a lot of time cross legged
on the floor playing hand drums while someone
rolled joints on a record sleeve
and someone else strummed
the same droning chord sequences
over
and
over.
We were very zen then
seeking the sound of one hand clapping.
Sheffield in the 80s was a clenched fist, was electro drum machines,
was Iron John workshops at anti sexist retreats,
was banging the drum as we took to the streets.
I joined a band called The Mysterons
which only played benefits - for miners and steelworkers,
against nuclear power, bombs, rape and rate capping.
We played Stand Down Margaret
and (We Don't Need That) Fascist Groove Thang.
I played cabasa on Stand By Me.
In the 90s in Birmingham libraries we ran a project about Silence.
A brilliant young percussionist
whose name now escapes me
played in the Central Library, built up more and more sound
around the ambient hum
of escalators, footfall,murmurings, phone bells.
How much could he enhance the sounds of a place that's thought of as silent
without rupturing the hush?
(We ran another workshop for writers who had to write poems which included a
silence
at the heart of their structure).
And the music librarian, John Gough,
played this piece by John Cage in the music library:
And now my son Joe plays the drums.
For his 21st birthday we bought him an udu - a ceramic bowl drum.
Drums connect us
though it drives me wild when he tap tip taps;
(the rest of the family are used to that).
Ten years ago, when we formed a band at work,
(called The Bettertones because we worked together in Betterton Street),
I tuned up my congas and went in search of a teacher.
I found one of the best in Robin Jones.
He asked me to play for him, then sighed and said,
"Okay, so you just tiptaptip on them."
and showed me how it was really done.
Learning new patterns involves lots of concentration
but the sense of satisfaction is immense
when everything at last begins to flow.
It seems such pure learning
to do something over and over
till it clicks
Drumming is about the beating of heads on the walls of cells,
the shaking of chains, the rattling of the bars of the cage.
Like the descendents of refugees
whose names are the mis-spellings of guards at borders,
of slaves named after their owners,
percussion instruments are improvised, bastardised
and drum patterns from different traditions
have been traded, stolen and muddled over centuries.
Timbales were originally made of buckets with skins across the top,
the clave played on a hoe wacked with a stick.
According to Robin the beat known as the rhumba
in America is not true Cuban rhumba
because a band came over from Cuba
to play a gig in Miami and between numbers
their Yankee host asked the Spanish speaking band leader
what kind of song they'd just played.
But the bandleader thought he was asking
what was coming up next.
Robin is Brazilian but trained in Cuba.
When Robin taught me he would say,
"Now if we were in Havana playing rumba with the guys.."
For our 50th birthdays Hattie and I went to Cuba.
and we went to the Bodegita del Medio,
the bar in Havana where Hemingway hung out.
We drank mojitos and to my delight
the guys invited me to play with them
- and I didn't mess up.
But I'm not that good really, nor that musical.
As Robin pointed out, I can't keep time too well,
though he also says that's not just the drummer's job.
With percussion as with so many others things in life
I'm at the level which briefly impresses the un-informed
but no real expert.
I know bits of stuff,
but have a terrible memory
and never learn many facts in the first place.
I catch the drift of things, I get the jist,
I sit silent in cafes
watching all that
animated chat around me,
tapping out its beat.
This yack
may be inane,
but it has
rhythmn for all that,
the pattern of exchange,
the rich sound colour of
personalities, characters,
improvising,
soloing,
paradiddling
together.
This may be the sound of one hand clapping.
We have nothing to say and we're saying it.
A tabla solo can express a multiplicity of moods and emotions,
complex as any symphony. Congas can make you smile and dance and fill up with love.
But I like the way drummers can be so offhand about what they do.
Even Ringo admits he could never be bothered to practice.
My teacher can be a hard taskmaster, deadly serious about his art,
but also says, "hey - it's only drums and shit, my friend!"
Like the old joke goes:
Question: What do you call someone who hangs around with musicians?
