Drums are used by many people and organisations for differing purposes, and often there is a leader of the group who has had no or little training in the musical side of playing drums. Djembemoves offers teacher training courses to those individuals and groups who would like or need some musical background to playing these instruments. The courses will make you more proficient and confident to deliver drumming courses to your group.
These courses are designed specifically for the teachers, with emphasis being given to the ability to teach a group of people. We offer the courses to help fill the “musical” gap in a teacher’s knowledge, and so the courses are all about the music itself, and how to create beautiful and interesting music. Sean from Djembemoves is a professional and full-time musician, you can read about his background here .
The 2 courses we offer are:
Foundation Course
Building Blocks Course
The following list gives an idea of the possible topics in the courses:
Foundation Course
- clear signals, breaks and pauses
- communication of rhythms to the participants, incluing being able to “sing” the rhythm
- counting in and out
- achieving the different sounds, technique
- teamwork, and splitting of groups
- how to write/notate the rhythms
- different rhythms and patterns
Building Blocks Course
- dynamics, in terms of tempo, loudness and intensity
- counting in and out while playing
- poly-rhythms: participants playing different rhythms
- focusing on listening to others while playing one’s own part
- further work on writing/notating
The courses are designed also to allow time for the participants to share experiences, and so help each other in the learning process. As such, each course will be different, and tailored to meet the exact needs of the particular participants in that course.
The course runs typically over a weekend, from 10am to 4pm on both days, incl. breaks. Venues and dates will be announced. There is a minimum of 8 participants. Please register your interest with us, thus helping us to create a course in your region.
The concept is to give teachers a foundation on which they can build their own courses for their participants. You can come to any course as you think necessary. If you require further musical input, then you can also visit our other courses where we teach traditional and modern West African rhythms to all interested people.
