Chris Brannick Masterclass
On Monday, some of Purcell’s percussionists enjoyed an extended hand drumming masterclass with polymath percussionist Chris Brannick, percussionist and founder member of Ensemble Bash, and Professor of Percussion at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
The focus to start with was Conga technique, whereby students explored different techniques for producing the various sounds common to Conga playing. This culminated in a massed Salsa groove, where members of the group demonstrated their newly-acquired techniques (some of them very impressively).
After that, two African dances followed, played on Djembes. The first, Kumpo, is a vibrant dance from Senegal, with a call played by the whole group followed by individual solos. The drumming in Kumpo is notable for its “cherry picking” action, where players throw their arms into the air, mid-phrase, as if to pluck cherries from a tree as one.
The group then studied Lenje, a Zambian dance with a more complex and extended rhythmic language, one characterised by cross patterns and complex off-beat riffs.
Much of this part of the session was built around learning how to build up African rhythmic language bit-by-bit, with the students copying Chris’s playing and memorising more parts of the musical language gradually. Once the whole language had been built up, the group stitched the whole dance together over a propulsive bass line on 2 low drums.
In between all this, Chris introduced the percussionists to a variety of games designed to build trust and energy among the group, as well as demonstrate how percussionists often have to straddle the line between musician and actor. These games therefore (and perhaps unsurprisingly) ranged from the problem solving type to the comic!
The group hugely enjoyed Chris’s quirky sense of humour and energy, and many of them made a point after the session to say how much they had enjoyed it. Thanks to all the percussionists for their involvement, and many thanks to Chris Brannick for his vibrant Monday afternoon session!
