Drum and Splash Teaching Faculty

Our Permanent Teaching Faculty
Drum and Splash at Four Quarters
See the Menu for this years Guest Teachers

Ken Crampton: Community Drum Circle
Eesa Greyson: Power Drumming and Dance
Kenyatta: Building the Base with the Djun
Daveed Korup: The Tao of the Drum
Jaqui MacMillan: The Joy of the Drum
Zaipo Oula: African Dance and Ceremony
Alex Wedmedyk: Drum Building+Care
ShadowDrake:Artistry in Fire

    One of the most cherished aspects of our culture at Drum and Splash is the relationship we have developed over the past decade with our permanent teaching faculty. In some cases for as long as ten years, we have worked together to develop a uniquely diverse and assessable festival, that is as much about a functioning alternative community as it is about the Drum.

    These Masters of Drum and Dance are more than good teachers, they are Friends, Family and Tribe. And they and their own families have grown with us as Drum and Splash has grown.

    This unique relationship allows our faculty to share with and guide the development of our attendees, not just as teachers, but as particapative Members of our Community and Tribe.

    It is this commitment that has helped make Drum and Splash such a very special and lasting experience.

Ken
Crampton

Community Drum Circle

Everybody Drum is an outreach program empowering people through the rhythms of visual and audible arts by visiting schools, working within the community, corporate conferences, Head Start and at-risk programs. Ken has been drumming and facilitating drum circles for over 12 years, and has studied with master facilitators and drummers, Arthur Hull, Babatunde Olatunji, and Mamady Keita.

Ken is the proprietor of Eyeclopes Studios, which showcases “Locally Grown Art” and empowers those who have taken the time and inspiration to produce art. A former student at the Corcoran School of Art, Ken has served as President of the Fredericksburg Center for the Creative Arts (1994-97) and created the now famous Fredericksburg New Years Eve Pear. Ken brings his pet dragon for a little exercise at Drum and Splash

Kenyatta
Building the Base

Kenyatta brings a rare accessibility and plain faced joy to the JunJuns, as the healing power of the heartbeat. He has answered the call since the age of five, when his father made presents to him of drums, and replaced then as they were worn out!

Kenyatta has studied at The Iroko Drum and Dance Society with Baba David Coleman. And performed with M'bemba Bangora and Raymond Sylla; as well as with the Cleveland Symphony Orchestra and at The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Kenyatta plays and teaches with elementary and Middle schools in the Cleveland area and colleges throughout the east coast

Daveed
Korup
The Tao of the Drum

    Daveed Korup sparks our imaginations through his unique style of drumming, which reflects a synthesis of many of the world's exotic percussion traditions into an invocative, penetrating voice for this millennium. A native of Illinois, Korup is the co-creator of DrumFest!, a hands-on, multi- cultural drumming experience for people of all ages. Through school assembly programs, artist-in-residency projects, concerts and workshops, Daveed introduces participants to the electrifying world of percussion and rhythm. Since it's inception, DrumFest! has reached tens of thousands of people, young and old, from all across the United States.
    Daveed has worked with musician and mentor, Billy Woods, performing the "Music of the Urban Gypsy" all across the country and is co-founder of Lights-On Productions, which promotes percussion performance and instructional projects. In 1994, they created the provocative percussion ensemble, Seeds of Time and have released three energizing recording projects, Eyes Behind the Veil, Seeds of Time -- an Invitation to Drum, and Rhythm Rides for Dumbek. In 2002, Korup self- published Tao Te Drum, which is a comprehensive hand drumming method that integrates Eastern and Western drumming traditions. For the past five years, Korup has been the lead percussionist for the Eurasian folk ensemble, Turku, which traveled to Samarkand, Uzbekistan in the fall of 2001 to participate in the Third Annual Sharq Taronalari Music Festival, sponsored by UNESCO and the Uzbek government.
    In addition to the technique of Dumbek, David will bring his well known Rhythm Playstation and present his intensive "Tao Te Drum: A Way of the Drum".

Jaqui MacMillan
The Joy of the Drum

Wammie Award Winner 1996-2003; Remo Drum Artist;
Founding and Board Memberof the Drum Circle Facilitators Guild;
First Place Mid Atlantic Songwriters' Competition

    Jaqui's drumming quest began in the early 1980's, when she started playing sessions with D.C. area musicians. Since then, she has studied with many Masters: Mamady Keita, Babatunde Olatunji, Shina DurosinmiEtti, Carlos Moore, Sam Turner, and at the Tam Tam Mandingue School, with Mahiri Fadjimba Keita (apprentice of Master Mamady Keita). She is also a graduate of the 1999 Drum Facilitators Playshop and the 2001 Drum Facilitators Mentor Program in Hawaii with Arthur Hull.
    Jaqui won the Washington Area Music Association’s "World Music Instrumentalist Award" for 1995 through 2003 and the "World Music Female Vocalist Award" for 2001. She performed with the Washington Area Music Award (WAMMIE) winning group, Big Village, for eleven years and produced six recordings ,(CD's / cassettes), with the group. She performed with Rachel & Jaqui - a World Beat / Folk duet, and Mama Muti - drum and vocal duet (with Amikaeyla Gaston), and has done many other solo performances and studio sessions.
    Venues played include: the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., The Wetlands in New York City, The Starwood Festival in upstate New York and hundreds of other festivals, clubs and smaller venues in the Mid Atlantic region. She has shared the stage with the Neville Brothers while performing with renowned sax man, Ron Holloway at the Artscape Festival (Baltimore, MD), and also with Mickey Hart (Grateful Dead), Giovanni Hidalgo and Baba Olatunji at the "Babatunde Olatunji Benefit Concert 2001" at the Paramount Theatre in New York. Her group, Big Village, opened for Shawn Colvin, Los Lobos, Rusted Root, Syd Straw, Vinx, Yothu Yindi, Wavy Gravy, Gheggy Tah, Betty and Tricky, among others.   Her duet, Mama Muti, performed and recorded (on the Sounds True label) with renowned astrologer and author, Caroline Casey.
    She is the co-founder and co-facilitator of the Village Tree , a drum, dance and "building community through rhythm" event held in Maryland. Jaqui is a REMO endorsee and facilitator and has facilitated drum circles for elementary schools, at summer programs for children, at hospitals, for corporate team building events, with "at risk" children and at centers for homeless and battered women. She is a founding and board member of the Drum Circle Facilitators Guild (DCFG), a non-profit organization based in Washington DC. Jaqui has taught privately and given workshops for over nine years through her program, "Drum For Joy!!!". Her main focus is the Djembe drum from West Africa, although she is also interested in and has studied congas and Afro-Cuban drumming, the dunun drums from West Africa and the Middle Eastern Doumbek. She suffuses her teaching and playing with great respect for the traditions and with the joy of drumming!
    Her TV appearances include the Fox 5 morning news in DC, a feature story on the Channel 9 evening news in North Carolina, a telethon for Children's Hospital (channel 9, DC), and many Mid-Atlantic Cable shows. Currently, she is working on a book about women who drum, and she is featured in the November 2000 issue of DRUM! Magazine.

    Jaqui believes that healing happens through the arts and music

Zaipo Oula
African Dance and Ceremony

    An electrifying performer who combines the formal ballet training of the Ecole de Danse et d'Echange Culturelle with his traditional roots of the Ivory Coast.
    Zaipo Oula is an international artist and the founder of Rochester, NY. Dance and Cultural Exchange, an African Rhythm and Dance school, and Director of the Baltimore International Rhythm and Drumming Society (BIRDS). Originally from the Ivory coast in West Africa, his professional goal is to reach out to communities and various artists, helping them come together to share joyful moments with music and dance. Mr. Zaipo uses his musical creativity to heal sadness while expressing his cultural uniqueness. His mission in life is to help others try to escape or at least ease some of the problems our communities are facing.
    Music and dance are ways that the people of the Ivory Coast express themselves. Through drumming and dancing, different tribes from his culture are able to communicate. Rhythm is what the drummer creates to express emotion in his audience. This emotion takes form through dance or movement. Everywhere Zaipo goes, he brings his knowledge of dance and the experience of an authentic African drummer and dancer.
    The culture of the Ivory Coast is rich in the traditions of storytelling, tribal rituals and chants. Mr. Zaipo feels that his place in the United States of America and the world is through his participation in preserving and promoting the authenticity of the African culture. He is and will continue to be a bridge to these resources and the communities that welcome him.

    Zaipo will be teaching West African dance in depth, as well as the elements of performance stagecraft, costume and maskmaking from the African perspective. A special treat is his series of seminars for children, as well as Evening Performance with his troupe.

Alex Wedmedyk
Drum Building, Care
and Drum Circle
Ettiquette

AlexWednedyk is a craftsman, drummer and facilitator,and has been building drums and playing them since 1990. Over the years he has had many teachers and shares "the jewels of knowledge" he has picked up along the way. All of his workshops emphasize that the Eternal Spring of Creativity is our Spirit, and that we connect to this source by enhancing our relationship with the Great Spirit. Our inner strength and outer power is directly related to how well we move through our lives "in rhythm". Through Earth Rhythm, he has created, with his wife Joy, various workshops and events on self discovery & personal empowerment. Alex has facilitated many workshops,drum circles and rituals throughout the Midwest. He has created the annual Adventures in Rhythm Drummers Retreat and the Rites of Spring Community Gathering of Ohio.