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The beat goes on at the World Music Festival
June 21, 2008
By Brent Bakeman
It took me back to my Grateful Dead days. Young, raggedly dressed shower-phobes rhythmically dancing in a style that cannot be taught. Definitely in their own world they don't seem to notice the audience seated around them but do hear the percussion bending and moving them in a cross between swimming and a seizure.
The audience, seated on the grass in front of the maybe two-dozen drummers, didn’t previously realize that they were going to be treated to this offbeat performance in addition to the one they came to see.
The drummers, about two-dozen were beating away on drums of all shapes and sizes, every now and then a whistle would scream out to keep time or signal a tempo change. The drummers took me back to my Southern California days. In a place where the weather is generally always agreeable, particularly if it has a beach, drum-circles are very common. Sometimes dozens of drummers all hammering away on percussion instruments of all kinds. The sets will go on for half an hour at a time with all these drummers, strangers often to one another, keeping time while — dare I say — responding to the beat of their own drum.
April 25th - 27th brought to The Seattle Center the 15th Annual World Rhythm Festival. The festival celebrates the percussive arts as well as dance from across the globe. Saturday was beautiful for much of the day. The drum circle was going, as were the dancers, the festival provided workshops and performances both inside and outside, as well as a marketplace in the Fisher Pavilion selling crafts, ethnic goods, as well as, of course, drums. There were probably over 40 vendors in the Pavilion, and as I walked through I really got the sense that many of the seemingly very interested shoppers would not have been into this scene before they came to the festival and responded to the beat. There were people leaving with newly purchased drums that looked like they had the rhythm of a carrot.
The ones that really got the Festival were the kids, nobody responds to a beat like children. And there were plenty of smiling kids, running around and dancing, also a dance that cannot be taught. Kids also like to bang on things, and as far as things to bang on, this was the place. Again the kids really got this festival.
Sunday despite the rain later in the day, the drummers and dancers were back and responding as well as creating the beat.
Much of the percussion as well as dance finds roots from African or Latin based tradition. This was not Keith Moon, we are talking hands on cowhide, and not generally the music or dance that most Americans are used to. The performances were indeed exotic, even in a very diverse area like Seattle, fascinating as well as alluring and even sometimes sexy, it became easy to see how those people that didn’t really know what they were coming to came away with a new flavor, a new beat. New ideas, different ways of living, different music and dance, all inspired by the ethnic introduction provided in the World Music Festival and endeared by the attendees compulsion to follow the beat.
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