Review of Drum Circle Spirit

by James Oshinsky, Ph.D.

There is something uniquely valuable in Arthur Hull’s book, Drum Circle Spirit for anyone who has ever stood in front of a room and led a music activity. Don’t let the title fool you — the content is not “New-Age-y,” and not just about drumming. It is a clear, well-organized, readable treatise on how to lead music activities, from the perspective of a generous and humorous master percussion teacher, and ambassador of “rhythmaculture.”

Those of you already familiar with Allauadin Matthieu’s The Listening Book will recognize the high praise in the following analogy: what The Listening Book is to personal music-making, Drum Circle Spirit is to facilitating music workshops. These are indispensable resources for anyone wishing to cultivate their expressive musicianship and share it with others.

Arthur begins with a description of his own life path into drum teaching. His territory spans the “hippie anarchistic drum-jam” set and the culture-specific indigenous music traditionalists. With great respect for both, he analyzes the unspoken etiquette for participating and leading. Somewhere along the way, Arthur discovered he was adept at sensing and using prevailing group energies to “shepherd” groups into states of higher quality music and “heads up” playing (that is, better results come from focused awareness and inter-communication). The examples he provides come from mundane, non-workshop experiences in airport waiting lines as well as from prime time events with hundreds of musicians.

In a style filled with humor, patience, and specific descriptive detail, Arthur analyzes the elements that make for gatherings in which everyone feels successful. He includes user-friendly taxonomies of basic percussion instruments and their uses, nonverbal conducting techniques, and group dynamics phenomena. He reveals his humanistic philosophical roots when he distinguishes facilitating from leading, and it is clear from his anecdotal examples that he most often works from a permissive style that allows each participant's unique individual contributions to surface. He reserves leading for more formal settings, where the agenda or curriculum is content-centered rather than people-centered. These principles of enlightened group facilitating transcend the content in which they are embedded. As a result, this book is as much about groups as it is about drums, and would be of equal value for public school music teachers, music therapists, creativity or personal growth workshop leaders, and management trainers.

Arthur has been inspired by the master drum teachers that proceeded him, most notably Babtunde Olatunji, to whom the book is dedicated. He spent time honing “platform presentation“ skills with the staff of his Village Music Circles™ organization and in a study group at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He edited and crafted his final drafts with the assistance of storytellers. These influences converge with synergistic effect. Drawing on his years of experience leading drumming workshops and spontaneous community drum happenings around the world, Arthur has developed a vocabulary for identifying the events that universally occur in workshops. He is adept at demystifying the subtle nonverbal elements that contribute to the high-energy magic of coordinated listening among players, and he is humble in analyzing the “train wrecks” that occur when communication breaks down. His range of knowledge includes instrument- and culture- specific details about world percussion, as you might expect, but what is most valuable in this book is his capacity to highlight aspects of workshop facilitating that we all have experienced, but may not have had a word for.

When can a leader best interject verbal instructions to a group of improvising musicians? What tools of body language are useful for large-group leading? How can you direct a group on the fly without stopping their process? How can you plan a sequence of activities for best strategic effect? What adjustments of leadership style are needed to work in educational settings? corporate settings? foreign countries? special populations? groups of over 500?

These are the kinds of wide-ranging topics that Drum Circle Spirit covers. When you turn the pages, it feels like you have been invited to sit in the “control booth” inside Arthur Hull’s head as he reconstructs his workshop experiences. He is a talented storyteller, able to uncover his past errors with warm self-acceptance, and his innovative discoveries with infectious enthusiasm. It is clear you are with a compatible and humble brother on a path of musical spirituality.

The CD included with the book was recorded live at a drum workshop, and there are annotated notes that allow the reader to follow along with the facilitator’s actions from start to finish. His writing is so vivid, however, that the book could easily stand alone without the CD.

To sum up, there are many gifted workshop leaders who know what they’re doing, and some of them are generously willing to share what they know. Fewer still are adept both at demonstrating their craft and analyzing it in words, and of these, only a small number are able to communicate in language both plain and profound. Arthur Hull has succeeded on each of these levels simultaneously, teaching a great deal about percussion and rhythm while incorporating his wisdom about managing group energies in the role of facilitator. Throughout his narrative, he communicates his love of musicality as a spiritual exercise, and welcomes all readers into his “rhythm church.” I strongly urge you join the choir.

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