Drummers speak a universal language

The voice came first, then the drum, in the process of humanity’s music-making. Not in the contemporary sense of music as an abstract phenomenon, of course, but as a function of evolving society -- via communication, ceremony, spirituality, etc. And the drum, by virtue of its enormous longevity, as well as its capacity for physical variation, probably has had a more diverse array of manifestations than any other single human tool.

All of which were impressively evident Saturday night in the performance of hand drummer Alan Rudolph’s Vashti World Percussion Ensemble. The ensemble, whose concert at the Electric Lodge Performance Space in Venice was presented as “A Winter Solstice Offering for Peace,” represented an impressive representation of the drum’s global significance via the presence of Rudolph, Randy Gloss and Munyungo Jackson from the United States, Brahim Fribgane from Morocco, Houman Pourmehdi from Iran, Poovalur Sriji from India and I Nyomen Wenten from Bali. Their colorful assemblage of instruments included such exotically titled entities as the dumbek, riq, pandeiro, shekere, daf, mridangam, kalimba and udu.

Given the array of players and the far-ranging cultures they represented, the program could easily have drifted into aural chaos, the various musical languages indecipherable without translators’ headphones. But Rudolph established common ground early in the program by having each participant seated upon one of the most basic of percussion instruments -- the box-like cajon. In the evening’s first segment, the players, employing an uncomplicated basic rhythm, joined in, one after the other, gradually building a collective sound instantly transcending their varied cultural backgrounds.

With that connection established, the celebration progressed through a series of unidentified selections employing a wide range of meters and accents. Along the way, there were opportunities for each player to display individual, often virtuosic, skills tinged with the unique qualities of music from various countries.

Rudolph has been coming together with percussionists from around the world for decades, seeking -- and usually finding -- musical communication that transcends language and international barriers. In the process, as in this stirring event, he offers a creative vision of a world in which cultures encounter each other via peaceful communion rather than confrontational differences.