KrotalArta Krotal Arta programs give students the opportunity to play drums and percussion instruments during an exciting, hands-on workshop session. Students experience the thrill of making music together with their classmates as they move through the instrument sections.
Multiple rhythms
Each session highlights multiple rhythms, vocal chants, musical games and teamwork activities designed to keep your students moving, engaged, learning, and having a blast. This is an amazing, interactive program your students will thoroughly enjoy!
Artas Conservatory KrotalArta
During the school year 2006-2007, I thought that for the better performance of my students in the sheet music (solfège), I would give them a test. In the Saturday workshop at the Artas Conservatory where I teach and where the rehearsals for the year’s concerts take place, I divided them into groups. Each would play a different part of the drums from the sheet music.
One bass drum, two floor toms, four snares, two hi-hats, and three percussion instruments, a tambourine. The exercises I wrote and gave them were reading exercises, different for each instrument (group). However, everyone would play in the same ‘tempo’. This took place for two months every other Saturday. Each time, I would write a more difficult reading exercise. KrotalArta
Various rhythmic patterns
It started slowly and with various rhythmic patterns that I applied, giving the entire ‘theme’ a unique timbre. With the teamwork and discipline that these children showed, an idea was born in me. I thought of creating a symmetrical group (regarding the number of individuals per instrument), with four snare drums, four bass drums, four tambourines, and one bass drum with a bell to keep the tempo. I wrote three pieces in which each group (instrument) played both the same and different values. Thus, a rhythmic game was created both between the groups and within each group among pairs. Each piece had a different style.
Drums and percussion
In general, the sound of the band, the pieces, and their performance make us original and unique among the percussion groups that exist in Greece and around the world. Why did we choose percussion, and how difficult and paradoxical is it for a band like ours to play such music in Arta? We chose percussion, particularly drums, because we were impressed by the sound, their entire dynamic stage presence, and the passion that anyone involved in playing them exudes. When we started playing, we discovered that the drums and percussion later became an extension of our character and personality.
