On Saturday, June 17, our second session of the Young Women's Drumming Empowerment Project summer program boasted 10 new members, 4 mentors and the assistance of 4 staff and volunteers plus our incredible poetry instructor, Laila Shereen Sakr. I am ecstatic, not to mention blown away by the talent, maturity, and diversity of our newly forming second year group.
Highlights!!
-For the first hour we drummed; new girls kept arriving and we were constantly getting up to add new chairs! By the end of drumming hour, there were 18 of us in a big circle all playing the KuKu rhythm (Guinean rhythm from the Mandingue people).
-The next big thing was another fun ice breaker from Mentorship Coordinator Dre that involved taking our shoes off and running around. Need anymore be said?
-Laila then instructed us to pound our chests and vocalize - to feel the vibration of our voices - and then she gave us wads of bubble gum! We chewed through 6 awesome pieces of poetry by June Jordan, Maya Angelou, Sandra Cisneros, Langston Hughes, JaHipster and Saul Williams, each taking turns to read, combatting our gum and the fans! After that we talked about the poems, got inspired, and went off to WRITE! We came back with incredible verses around the hook Laila gave us - "Hang your heart light, baby, Hang your heart bright." Several young women read, and knocked us out with their words.
-We took the last half hour of the session to divide up into mentorship clusters where the She Poets of 2005 (our beloved mentors!) could sit down with a few new members each and begin the process of bonding. This was a beautiful time in our session and we will be holding mentor/mentee time during the last half hour of each session from here on out!
-We ended with some crazy toning from Kristen - going up the chakras with our voices and trying not to laugh!!
We meet again THIS WEEKEND - Saturday June 24, 2006 from 12-3 p.m. at St Stephens Church in the Auditorium to finish what we started with Ms. Laila. This week, girls are instructed to write stream of consciousness for at least 15 minutes - this means the pen never leaves the page - and to take another 45 minutes or more to A. work on the poem from last week, or B. select a morsel from the stream of consciousness and create a new poem, or C. BOTH!
Can't Wait!
Peace and Rhythm
Kristen Arant, Founding Director
YWDEP
202-213-7810
kristen@youngwomendrum.org
www.youngwomendrum.org
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The Young Women’s Drumming Empowerment Project seeks to empower a core group of young women by guiding them in a process of learning how to play hand drums and percussion, along with expressing their opinions and telling their stories. The girls work with local artists to build a strong collection of rhythms, songs & spoken word. The 12-week project culminates with 3 final performances featuring the work of the project participants. Project updates and developments are listed below.
