Last Weekend - Drumming and Ball
This past weekend I wore myself out, and I'm only now starting to recover.
Friday night I went to a local drum circle. At one point I ended up being the one to start off the rhythm, but then as it went on, I could feel my arms tensing up (making it harder to play) while my head was reminding me that I was the base of the rhythm. Of course, when I did drop out periodically everyone else kept going, and eventually when things got faster I switched from hand-drumming to sticking on the metal rim of my drum. Other times I also felt like I was playing a lead or at least prominently-supporting role, partly because less than half a dozen people there (out of 16) were playing drums rather than shakers and blocks and such.
Saturday was the big Canton area Pagans Witches' Ball. I'd stayed out of most of the planning of this thing because I wasn't entirely sure it was a good idea. (Mostly that enough people would come to pay for it.) But my music collection ended up being a major source of the music gathered for it, and I'd agreed to show up a few hours early Saturday to help out.
It turned out that the person who'd been assigned to bring the sound system was unable to make it, so I went out looking for options, and came up with something that worked for a microphone but not for music. Meanwhile someone else went home and grabbed a his son's stereo system, which turned out to have a dead left channel. So we improvised, and came up with music only about an hour after the start of the event.
Later we had a drum circle there. Two of us had brought our piles of percussion implements, and we dumped them in the center of the floor. Then I took my drum with me backstage, faded out the CD, then from behind the curtain pounded the drum a few times, and came out from behind the stage curtain, pounded a few more times, then started a rhythm as I headed toward the center where the other drummers and drums were. A few people joined in, we kept it up for a while, and it sounded great. We started a new round, and this time nontacitare started banging out a rhythm on the bells, so we ended up following her; when she realized that, though, she got self-conscious and forgot what she'd been playing, but it still sounded great. The first two or three rounds of drumming got applause from the crowd, but after that we had a harder time sounding cohesive -- partly because I hadn't realized that even experienced drummers were looking to me for leadership, and people would get lost when I started making my patterns more interesting. Oops.
Eventually the drumming petered out and gave way to danceable music, and I started taking lots of pictures. Of course, flashes have their limits, and I didn't have my tripod on me, so I wasn't entirely satisfied with the usually dark and/or blurry results.
Finally, people started leaving, so I started helping with the cleanup. Mostly drying and putting away dishes.... and bantering with the rest of the cleanup crew. We finished up, sat around chatting for a while, and then we were kicked out around 1am. (Oh yeah, and around 40-50 people had shown up, so we probably didn't make all the money back, but didn't do too bad either.)
Sunday we'd intended to rake leaves. But it was really wet out, and I wasn't feeling all that well, so I ended up napping all afternoon. nontacitare even checked my temperature, but that didn't give me any more credibility. I felt weak all the way until this evening. I guess Saturday really wore me down.
Friday night I went to a local drum circle. At one point I ended up being the one to start off the rhythm, but then as it went on, I could feel my arms tensing up (making it harder to play) while my head was reminding me that I was the base of the rhythm. Of course, when I did drop out periodically everyone else kept going, and eventually when things got faster I switched from hand-drumming to sticking on the metal rim of my drum. Other times I also felt like I was playing a lead or at least prominently-supporting role, partly because less than half a dozen people there (out of 16) were playing drums rather than shakers and blocks and such.
Saturday was the big Canton area Pagans Witches' Ball. I'd stayed out of most of the planning of this thing because I wasn't entirely sure it was a good idea. (Mostly that enough people would come to pay for it.) But my music collection ended up being a major source of the music gathered for it, and I'd agreed to show up a few hours early Saturday to help out.
It turned out that the person who'd been assigned to bring the sound system was unable to make it, so I went out looking for options, and came up with something that worked for a microphone but not for music. Meanwhile someone else went home and grabbed a his son's stereo system, which turned out to have a dead left channel. So we improvised, and came up with music only about an hour after the start of the event.
Later we had a drum circle there. Two of us had brought our piles of percussion implements, and we dumped them in the center of the floor. Then I took my drum with me backstage, faded out the CD, then from behind the curtain pounded the drum a few times, and came out from behind the stage curtain, pounded a few more times, then started a rhythm as I headed toward the center where the other drummers and drums were. A few people joined in, we kept it up for a while, and it sounded great. We started a new round, and this time nontacitare started banging out a rhythm on the bells, so we ended up following her; when she realized that, though, she got self-conscious and forgot what she'd been playing, but it still sounded great. The first two or three rounds of drumming got applause from the crowd, but after that we had a harder time sounding cohesive -- partly because I hadn't realized that even experienced drummers were looking to me for leadership, and people would get lost when I started making my patterns more interesting. Oops.
Eventually the drumming petered out and gave way to danceable music, and I started taking lots of pictures. Of course, flashes have their limits, and I didn't have my tripod on me, so I wasn't entirely satisfied with the usually dark and/or blurry results.
Finally, people started leaving, so I started helping with the cleanup. Mostly drying and putting away dishes.... and bantering with the rest of the cleanup crew. We finished up, sat around chatting for a while, and then we were kicked out around 1am. (Oh yeah, and around 40-50 people had shown up, so we probably didn't make all the money back, but didn't do too bad either.)
Sunday we'd intended to rake leaves. But it was really wet out, and I wasn't feeling all that well, so I ended up napping all afternoon. nontacitare even checked my temperature, but that didn't give me any more credibility. I felt weak all the way until this evening. I guess Saturday really wore me down.