Better World Network

Attached to this post is a video recording of a drum circle that meets in North San Diego County every week. It is taken with a camera phone, an experiment in seeing what can be done with simple phones around the world. The idea is to experiment with what can be done spontaneously and simply, but still convey the experience of the music. Since drumming is such a universal form of music and communication, we are exploring ways of connecting folks through drumming and podcasting… what we are calling drumcasting. Jason Manalli is the person being interviewed at the beginning; the large blue drum towards the second half of the video is a trash can that was used when the group ran out of drums.
We talked a little about Drumcasting at the Paris Uplift Academy workshop.  Here are Raoul Weiler of the Club of Rome in Belgium and Kwame Agabe of the UN Environmental Programme at the Paris workshop, talking about introducing some Drumcast-related activity at a forthcoming conference in Nigeria. Kwame spoke of the diminishing role of drumming in Africa today, as celebrations use boom boxes and recorded music instead of drums.  Maybe highlighting drumming as a global communications tool can help restore some local interest in preserving their drum heritage.  Here are some ideas on drumcasting.

Drumming is a universal communications tool… people all over the world use drums for celebration. We have opened up a new Drumcast Category on Better World Network to share drumming stories and performances around the world. We will be looking at ways of doing interactive drumming, too, allowing folks to drum together. Here are some initial notes about drumcasting.

Blending African drums with Carribean traditions, rum is poured on a Garifuna drum.