“I run fun and accessible Portsmouth percussion group - It’s beautiful to see people shine”
Watch as we speak to Brandon Prince from DrumNation in Portsmouth on how the community percussion group helps people to de-stress and relax.
We visited Portsmouth’s DrumNation Tribe - a not-for-profit community group of musicians, drummers and percussionists where anyone can get involved.
Created over 20 years ago, DrumNation Tribe’s founder Brandon Prince, wanted to provide music which was accessible at all levels.
Brandon Prince, founder of DrumNation Tribe, said: “I started this really just like a tribe, like a friendship, like a village so that people could get involved, turn up when they wanted, they can find their own level and have fun. If people spoke a different language they could still play, even if they couldn't speak to each other.
“There's a therapeutic aspect to it that actually produces emotional, physical, psychological changes in people so it helps people to get confidence, it helps them to relax even on a basic level and it's something where you couldn't do this with violins, cellos and pianos but by having percussion people can be doing something within 30 minutes that sounds reasonable and is exciting.”
Jo Bonsor, a group facilitator at DrumNation Tribe, said: “Most of the rhythms that we play are from West Africa, there's kind of our own take on West African rhythms and most of those rhythms come from some sort of celebration, whether it's celebrating a good harvest or a marriage, when you look back at the history of the rhythms, they're all about celebrating so they lift you up, it's just good fun.”
Brandon said: “It's people being able to not only lose themselves in the rhythm but in that process of losing themselves they find themselves as well, they explore a different aspect of themselves.
“People say they're not musical, they haven't got any sense of rhythm, people discover that they've got this idea of themselves which is not true, that everybody has rhythm and everybody has an internal music and that's the beautiful thing when you see people shine and coming out of themselves. In my lifetime, it's one of the things I'm most proud of starting this.”
For more information visit drumnationtribe.godaddysites.com