Research

Over the last eight years, I have increasingly carried out research projects in Colombia that have taken the shape of concert series, premiering new works by Latin American composers, and ethnographic research with master folkloric musicians in Afro-Colombian genres. Much of this research was made possible by receiving funding through the Fulbright Grant (2011-2012) and the Graduate Presser Award (2014). My most recent research trip to Brazil to study Candomblé with Jorge Alabê was funded by travel awards from CLACS, the Office of Research, and the Peck School of the Arts at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (2019).

Cantigas e Ritmos a dos Orixas: The Language of Drumming in Afro-Brazilian Candomblé Ketu. Over the past seven years, I researched, transcribed, and analyzed the performance practice and improvisation strategies Jorge Alabê, a master percussionist, and singer in the Afro-Brazilian religion of Candomblé. Along with trips to Brazil to attend Candomblé ceremonies with Jorge, this research is the subject of my doctoral dissertation at Indiana University, The Language of Drumming in Afro-Brazilian Candomblé Ketu: A Method Book Based on The Performance Practice and Improvisation Strategies of Jorge Alabê.

I am now in the process of publishing this method book. Using the analogy of language, the book focuses on the conversation between drum, dance, and Orixá (Afro-Brazilian deities) to codify the stylized improvisations of the rum player (lead drummer) within the practice and performance of the Candomblé liturgy. Below is a sample of the upcoming book publication.

Alegre! The Language of Drumming in Colombia’s Caribbean Coast: This is an ongoing project involving ethnographic research with master Colombian folkloric percussionists. The goal of the research is to codify the language of drumming within multiple genres of Afro-Colombian percussion into a methodology for learning to play in the style of this rich musical tradition. This will be a significant contribution to the percussive arts community as an underrepresented Caribbean musical genre in the United States.

The Contemporary Percussion Sound Exchange Project was a project to promote cross-cultural exchange through the commissioning and premiering of fifteen new works by American and Colombian composers during my year of research as a Fulbright scholar in Bogotá, Colombia. I premiered these new works in a five-concert recital series at major concert halls in Bogotá.

Perspectives from Latin America is a current project in which I curate a recital series that features percussion works by Latin American composers. The concept of the series is to develop a Pan-American musical dialogue instead of a Eurocentric one, and to share the great wealth of percussion repertoire of Latin America with the percussion community in the United States.