Wrapping Up An Amazing Year and Looking Ahead!

What a year it's been!  Since returning from Brazil in mid-September, we at Drumming For Social Change have been busy!  We've presented workshops all over the country, led professional development sessions, put together performances, created curriculum, and much more.  We are thrilled about the work we've accomplished in the year since we launched our Indiegogo campaign to fund our Brazil trip.  This is just the beginning for us!  We are dreaming big and going hard, so please keep in touch with us as we continue to turn our dream of using world music and culture based programing to create, inspire, and make a difference in our community.

Here's a recap of some of our recent activities:

DSC Capoeira Class at Daroff Charter

On June 4th, we visited Daroff Charter School in Northwest Philadelphia where we led kindergarteners, 1st graders, and 2nd graders through some basics of Capoeira.  Capoeira is a Brazilian dance-infused martial art that teaches fundamentals of co-ordination, communication, rhythm, song, and dance.  We had so much fun working with the young capoeiristas at Daroff and want to throw a huge thanks to DSC funder Kendra Balmer for inviting us to come and present.  As always, here's a video from our workshop and some pics:

Our host, DSC funder Kendra Balmer

 

DSC Workshop at Bronx Writing Academy

On June 6, Gabriel led a workshop on Afro-Brazilian music at Bronx Writing Academy, a public school in the South Bronx.  New York public schools are notoriously lacking in recourses.  The Bronx Writing Academy has no music teacher in residence.  The students receive one block of gym and one block of art PER WEEK.  These students have no access to creative outlets within their schools.  Luckily for them, the teachers at BWA seem extremely dedicated to providing them with high quality education and attention despite the school's lack of recourses.  After learning that a handful of kids didn't speak English, Gabriel ended up leading the workshop in broken Spanish.  The workshop was certainly a challenge, but incredibly rewarding.  Here are a few pics:

Summer Plans

We've been blessed this year with incredible momentum and things are by no means going to slow down.  Here are our plans for the summer:

BRAD will be teaching at Play On, Philly's summer camp during July.  In addition, he will be traveling to Tegucigalpa, Honduras and Beijing, China as a featured guest artist at each country's international percussion festival.  Brad is excited for the opportunity to perform, present workshops, and explore the rich cultures of both places.  When he comes back, hopefully his Spanish and cooking will have improved! ;)

GABRIEL is returning to Salvador for a month to continue exploring the music and culture of Afro-Brazil.  He will be working closely with NEOJIBA and learning first hand about El Sistema in South America.  He hopes to visit more Candomble ceremonies, improve his Portuguese, and maybe, just maybe, catch a world cup game!

We will be posting throughout the summer, so please stay tuned!