Posted in African Dance Workshops, African Drumming Workshops, Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on May 9, 2013 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
A belated, but nevertheless massive thank you from Drumroots and Tanante to all involved in organizing the Mamady Keita Weekend 2013, last month. We had an awesome time at the event, really enjoyed being there and both supporting Iya Sako’s workshops and participating in Mamdy Keita’s. There was an ace vibe at the venue and it was excellent to see lots of old friendly faces that we haven’t seen for a while.
As for the evening’s entertainment; sadly we didn’t get to see much of the other acts, but Tanante with Iya Sako and Sens Sagna hugely enjoyed performing for you all. Thanks to everybody present who cheered, clapped and danced to our music, and a massive thanks to our friends who joined us on stage for the end of our set.
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Posted in African Drumming Workshops, Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on February 8, 2013 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
North Hartfordshire College is holding a free event to celebrate diversity in the community on Wednesday 13th February at the Stevenage Centre. We are proud to be a part of this
fantastic community event and will be running three hour long African Djembe drumming workshops for all ages and abilities from 1pm until 4pm.
At the college there will be a chance to experience the multimedia art exhibition “Keeping Memories: The Rwandan Community in the UK exhibition.”
Throughout the day there will also be a whole host of other activities including dance performances and workshops run by Act One Arts Base which is a local, accessible dance organisation run by disabled and non-disabled people.
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Posted in Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on January 10, 2013 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
Tanante were recently invited to perform at the birdcage in Manchester city centre for the Nando’s Christmas party. The famous chicken restaurant chain
Nando’s held its staff Christmas party at the
Birdcage venue in Manchester city centre. Nando’s employees from all over the North West enjoyed an African safari themed fancy dress party with stilt walkers, African acrobats and of course the West African drumming sounds of our very own band
Tanante.
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Posted in African Dance Workshops, African Drumming Workshops, Festivals, Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on November 20, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
Drumroots are proud to announce that we will be supporting the upcoming
Mamady Keita Weekend. The full weekend of workshops and performances surrounding the visit from the world's most popular and celebrated djembe player,
Mamady Keita is a huge event in the West African music scene's calendar in this country, and all those who know and love West African drumming will be excited in making preparations for getting involved in this extra special weekend!
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Posted in African Drumming Workshops, Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on November 20, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
Drumroots recently enjoyed leading African drumming workshops for the nursery children of
Didsbury Road Primary School. Joining us for this special occasion was Andy Garvey an excellent djembe, dun-dun drummer and ba
lafon (West African xylophone) player, from our very own performance troupe,
Tanante.
The enthusiastic groups of three to four year olds joined the workshops dressed in their own home made African clothes and were wearing the fantastic masks that they had made. Each child displayed amazing drumming skills through the fun activities that we lead. They especially enjoyed playing the games ‘we are the elephants’ and ‘rumble in the jungle’.
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Posted in African Dance Workshops, African Drumming Workshops, Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on November 7, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
Drumroots were invited to St Gabriels high school for the
Bury African outreach Charity coffee morning. Our job: to bring the space to life with our drumming, lead djembe workshops and to perform with the participants on the main stage. For this event we were joined by our talented Senegalese dancer, drummer and singer
Sens Sagna. As we arrived we realised that this was no ordinary coffee morning but in fact Bury African outreach’s 20th year anniversary, and a very busy fund raising event with activities such as wheel of fortune, tombola and many stalls selling all manner of things; African food, flowers, cakes, bric-a-brac and sweets, all to raise money with all proceeds going to the Bury African Outreach charity.
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Posted in African Drumming Workshops, Tanante Performance Group Posted on November 6, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
Last week Drumroots were invited by The
Co-operative Group to their
Co-operatives United event in Manchester to perform with our Drumroots community djembe group and to facilitate two drop in style African drumming workshops. This was a great opportunity for us to stand long side other global co-operatives and profile the work we do and how proud we are that Drumroots too, is a workers co-operative.
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Posted in African Dance Workshops, Music & Video, Tanante Performance Group, Uncategorized Posted on October 21, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
The Beat Artistes are back! With our African Drumming Master Samsou, we've been working hard over the summer in preparation for this event. Our new set raises the bar with heavy African rhythms, polished arrangements and choreographed dance moves. We’re really looking forward to taking this practice public, and what better place to do it than at a happening new
African Dance Party event.
Joining us for the event and on the bill will be the outstanding African Drumming troupe,
Kontaani. This hard working collective from Macclesfield are incredible to watch and perform with awesome energy and good vibes.
There will also be an early evening dance workshop to kick things off and later on DJ’s playing a range of quality African dance music.
Just to wet your appetite, here’s a video of one of the Beat Artistes, featuring
Iya Sako, recent performances at Manchester’s Parklife festival. Watch the video then read on for details of the African Dance party, we’ll see you there!
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Posted in Drums for Sale Posted on October 18, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
We are pleased to announce that we will now be stocking
Protection Racket drum bags. Seeing as we import and build up some of the
best quality djembes available on these shores, we though it only sensible to get hold of the best quality bags too! As any djembe player knows if you have djembe that is your prized possession, you’d do anything to keep it safe and sound, well those in the know will tell you that protection Racket bags are the best bet.
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Posted in African Drumming Workshops, Uncategorized Posted on September 27, 2012 by John Tullo | Leave a comment »
We at Drumroots were lucky enough to work with eight musically talented pupils on their masters degree training course with
Nordoff Robbins. This mixed group were not only great musicians but great fun to be around. Over the course of four separate two hour sessions held in the
Royal Northern College of Music studios we taught, as well as games and exercises, a number of different traditional rhythms with accompaniments, breaks, solos, songs and dun-dun bass lines. This developed their West African drum playing skills to a high level whilst teaching drum circle leadership.
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A belated, but nevertheless massive thank you from Drumroots and Tanante to all involved in organizing the Mamady Keita Weekend 2013, last month. We had an awesome time at the event, really enjoyed being there and both supporting Iya Sako’s workshops and participating in Mamdy Keita’s. There was an ace vibe at the venue and it was excellent to see lots of old friendly faces that we haven’t seen for a while.
