We are so fortunate to have these gifted teachers and performers.
We will be adding a few more featured teachers and performers.
As they are confirmed we will announce them here.
Ubaka Hill
Teacher and Performer
Musician, Percussionist, Teaching Artist, Inspirational Speaker and Visual Artist.
Ubaka has been performing and teaching Women how to drum for over 35yrs throughout the US and abroad.
Ubaka is the original founder and Music Director of the national Drumsong Orchestra and currently, of the Hudson Valley, NY DSO.
In addition, Ubaka is the Founder of the Drumsong Institute Museum of Women’s Drumming Tradition’s, Visionary Founder and Producer of the Million Women Drummers Global Initiative and the Co-Founder / Co-Producer of the Catskill Mountain Women’s World Drum and Percussion Happen’n.
Over the years, Ubaka has been a returning Teaching Artist, Presenter, Performer and Inspirational Speaker at many Women’s Conferences, Drum Camps and Women’s Music Festivals, such as Omega Institute, Kripalu, Michigan Women’s Music Festival, National Women’s Music Festival, Ontario Women’s Drum Camp, Northeast Women’s Herbal Conference, Women of Power Conferences, Bumbada Drum Camp, Born To Drum and Hollyhock Wellness Retreat Center, Center for Creative Education, to name a few.
Ubaka has 3 Music CD’s and a collection of Note Cards of her oil paintings and graphic art.
Ubaka makes her home in Upstate NY were she currently offers weekly Drumsong Orchestra Playshops for Women.
“We come from a long line of powerful Women Drummers”
Tammi Hessen
Teacher
Tammi Hessen is drawn to transformative arts—she is a local therapist and drumming teacher in the Lancaster, Reading, and Harrisburg areas. Tammi teaches at Franklin & Marshall College and has taught at Millersville University, has a small private therapy practice, teaches empowering local drumming classes, is a member of several music bands and performance groups, is a mother, and lives with her family in Lancaster. Ready to begin your journey? Contact Tammi for private drumming lessons or group classes, or for performances and school programs.
TammiHessen.com
Teacher and Performer
VALERIE NARANJO
Valerie
Valerie Dee Naranjo (percussionist, vocalist, composer, clinician) known for her pioneering efforts in West African keyboard percussion music, is originally from Southern Colorado. She moved to New York City after completing studies in vocal and instrumental music education (University of Oklahoma) and Percussion Performance (Ithaca College). In 1988 her playing of the gyil’s traditional repertoire in Ghana’s Kobine Festival of Traditional Music led to the declaration of a chiefly decree in the Dagara nation that women be allowed to play the instrument for the first time.
She plays percussion for NBC’s Saturday Night Live Band, and has recorded and performed with Broadway’s The Lion King, The Philip Glass Ensemble, David Byrne, The Paul Winter Consort, Tori Amos, Airto Moreira, and the international percussion ensemble, MEGADRUMS, which includes Milton Cardona, Zakir Hussein, and Glen Velez.
On six continents she endorses Avedis Zildjian (cymbals) Pearl/Adams (Latin and concert percussion) and Vic Firth products as a soloist and clinician.
Her recent film score recordings include Final Fantasy – The Dream Within and Frida. Her work and music have been written about in Modern Drummer, Drum!, Rhythm, Percussive Notes, and World Percussion Rhythm. She was named World Music Percussionist of the Year in 2005 and 2008, as winner of DRUM! magazine’s Reader’s Poll in that category. She has recorded several CDs of traditional gyil music with Kakraba Lobi and Barry Olsen, and the CD Zie Mwea with Mr. Olsen and Bernard Woma. Her solo Native American CD Orenda is on the Ellipsis Arts Label, and her series of 16 written transcriptions and CDs, West African Music for the Marimba Soloist, Traditional World Music for Western Percussion Ensemble, and Lewaa’s Dream (Ancient and Contemporary Music for West African Marimba) are published by Mandara Music.
Valerie has apprenticed with some of America’s and West Africa’s strictest master percussionists, including Leigh Howard Stevens, Gordon Stout, Dave Samuels, Godwin Agbelli, and Adama Drame, and continues to spend summers in Ghana to further her perucussion study with maestros Yotere Baere and Kofi Misiso. She has also researched and studied in Botswana, Burkina Faso, Egypt, Morrocco, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa, where, in 1994 with Thuli Dumakude, she opened Johannesburg’s Civic Theatre to its first post-apartheid audiences in the production Buya Africa.
Women of the Calabash
Teachers and Performers
Women of The Calabash
Women Of The Calabash was formed in 1978 by its founder and artistic director, the late Madeleine Yayodele Nelson. Yayo, as she was affectionately called, was respected as a vocalist, vocal arranger, percussionist and master of the craft of playing and making shekeres. Her scope and expertise brought her to the attention of Paul Simon with whom she performed on his album, “Rhythm Of The Saints” and received a platinum record.
The phenomenal performance ensemble combines traditional instruments, vocals and traditional music forms with contemporary influences. Through their performance and informal dialogue, Women Of The Calabash introduce audiences of all ages to the history and playing techniques of a wide variety of instruments. By performing a variety of music from Africa, the Caribbean and Black America, this ensemble crosses boundaries of style and instrumentation to give unity and context to the African American experience.
Carolyn Brandy
Teacher and Performer
Carolyn Brandy
is a percussionist, composer, educator, performer, cultural worker, and mom. She started playing the conga drums in 1968 and has been a pioneer in opening doors for women in the world of Afro-Cuban percussion. She has led six tours to the Island of Cuba to study music and dance with masters of Afro-Cuban folkloric music. She has a degree in music from Holy Names University in Oakland.
arolyn is a spirit teacher. She gained visibility and respect in the Women’s Music community in the seventies as a founding member of the jazz quintet Alive! It was groundbreaking. Women playing jazz! Not playing standard jazz, but jazz that grew out of a feminist woman identified esthetic.
Then Carolyn founded Sistah Boom in the SF Bay Area, a large mobile ensemble of women drummers, created to call community together, letting the drum invite us to our highest selves. Their first outing was at the San Francisco Gay Pride parade in 1981. The spirit of the room—or the street—rises when the sound of Sista Boom arrives on the scene.
Collaborating with many Bay Area Artists, Carolyn played with the vocal/percussion group OJALÁ! which was selected to attend the Festival Del Caribe in Santiago de Cuba in 2014.
Carolyn is the founder of the non-profit organization, Women Drummers International, and is the producer of the Born To Drum Camp for Women Drummers, which was created to inspire and empower women students, teachers and performers of hand percussion.
Fre Atlast
Teacher, Heartbeat Drum Facilitator
. Fre is a Multi-Instrumental Performer, Producer, Resident Teaching Artist, Composer, Foley Artist and Community Activist. She founded the Elders Drum Project in 1998 and has been teaching the Elders Method of music making to professionals ever since. Her mission is Drumming for Peace and Justice, following the vision of our elders and honoring our Ancestors.
