ABSTRACT
In a weekend frame drum workshop at a beautiful spiritual retreat in the Ozark Mountains, USA, Layne Redmond, master frame drummer, presents a guided visualization to a group of participants. The drum workshops of Redmond and Hull are just two of hundreds that are flowering throughout the United States alone. Drumming is reclaiming its time-honoured status as well as its function in traditional cultures as a community activity that creates a spiritual bond among its practitioners. In the nineteenth century Max Weber feared that rationalization would result in the secularization of modern society, to the extent that religion would be so removed from modern culture that it would lead to a 'disenchantment of the world'. Although the drum has always been an essential part of jazz, swing, blues and rock, the 1950s and 1960s brought increased attention to drums when America's 'Beat' generation gathered in smoke-filled coffee houses to reflect upon poetry recited to the sharp accent of bongos.
