Damon Frazier
(West African Drumming and Percussion with D. Frazier)

Okla. City, OK
(405) 535-6003
E-mail: rithm5@yahoo.com
Web: www.rithmcompany.com

Discipline:
Music & Traditional Arts: African percussion

Participants:
Early Childhood, Childhood, Adolescents, Youth at Risk, Adults, Older Adults and those with special needs

Sites:
Schools: Elementary, Middle, High and Alternative Ed
Community Sites: Art Centers, Libraries, Senior Centers, Parks & Recreation Centers

Availability:
Summers, weekdays, evenings and school year, Statewide

Bio:
D. Frazier is an artist working primarily in traditional African percussion, electronic music, and video production.  Several master musicians from Africa and America noticed his keen interest in playing traditional rhythms, and took him as an apprentice.  Frazier has studied various African instruments, their meaning, how they are traditionally played, and how to build and repair them.  After traveling throughout West Africa and the United States to learn more about African music, he began teaching workshops, providing lectured demonstrations, and performing across the United States.  Frazier’s remarkable ability to combine traditional African rhythms and styles with his music creates a refreshing and unique sound that inspires the soul and broadens the mind.

Arts Learning Goals:

• All participants will be using Traditional West African Drums and Percussion.
• Participants will learn the history and Origin of each instrument and why they are played in Africa.
• Participants will learn the basic techniques and how to play African instruments.
• Participants will learn how to play as a group and how there are individual parts played in a group or ensemble.
• Participants will be able to perform Traditional West African Rhythms that are over hundreds of years old, Using Call and Response and Polyrhythms.
• Participants will learn how Music plays a major part in African Culture and how every individual has a role in the Village.
• It takes a village to raise a child, and I will present the music and art of that Village.  African drumming has calming rhythms and sounds that calm the human mind.