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This is incredible...check this brother Celio Gonzales who is missing fingers on both hands....and can still play!!...

http://youtu.be/Vi0ISZnEXPY

WOW HES NICE

OMG!!!! Okay, anytime my hands might have a slight ache, I'll just remember this guy's style.

and he's ONLY 7 YEARS OLD!...

http://youtu.be/DEXg6akP7eE

JohnnyConga wrote:and he's ONLY 7 YEARS OLD!...

http://youtu.be/DEXg6akP7eE

Yep, and that vid is 2 years old. There are a few more recent vids of him floating about. The kids skills have grown nicely over the last 2 yrs.

Just to touch on this a bit further and side tracking a little, I took my laptop with me when I returned and moved to Cuba for 6 months, and showed some peeps a few video clips of child prodigy's (among a whole heap of other videos), and they were like, 'yeh and?' Was nothing new to them. And then over my time there I went on to see countless little kids that were playing their ass off, so many are born into drumming families or drumming neighbourhoods. It happens everywhere. Kids are born and it aint long before they have a spoon or a stick and whacking a can, bucket, empty bottle or wooden box and singing. Easy to see how these kids grow into people like Pedrito Martinez for example.
From the families of Rumberos de Cuba, Clave y Guaguanco, Munequitos de Matanzas, Solar de los Seis, Yoruba Andabo and many more all have little kids which have their eyes firmly placed on positions within the groups. And these kids are coming up fiercely.
Then you got the neighbourhood kids with their own rumba and comparsa groups, and the families of the guys playing in the main bands, no such thing as child prodigy in Cuba, its perfectly normal. For a kid to be labelled a prodigy, they would have to be light years ahead. Even in this years competition Fiesta Del Tambor, you had little 4, 5, 6 and 7 yr olds playing competing and playing along side teenagers, adolescents and adults.

When I started going to the Central Park rumbas in 1972, I was always amazed at little kids that would sit down on quinto and play better than most of the adults. This continued into the 80s but has completely disappeared in the last 20 years in NYC. I haven't seen this particular kid in the park yet, but he plays great and obviously someone started him very young in NYC. We need to be teaching our kids to play starting when they are young, or accept that the best drummers will always come from Cuba already monsters. Probably true anyway...

jorge wrote:We need to be teaching our kids to play starting when they are young

Definately, the first 7 years are the most vital.

JohnnyConga wrote:This is incredible...check this brother Celio Gonzales who is missing fingers on both hands....and can still play!!...

http://youtu.be/Vi0ISZnEXPY

It took me a while to respond to this post, the timing was a little stunning for me.

We have a brother of the drum here on the island that recently lost the fingers on his right hand in a construction accident. 2 were reattached, but still being rehabilitated. Given his gifts, drive and dedication to the craft it’s likely that he’ll eventually be back on the drums.

Johnny – this post illustrates that drumming and music is in our souls and minds not the tools, such as our hands, that we use to enact it. Thanks!

RR

In my several trips to Africa and Cuba I have seen quite a few kids who were playing at a level seemingly beyond their years (at least for us who are not used to seeing such skills at a young age).
One boy in particular from Ghana stays in my memory. This kid (who was only about 8 or 9) held the position of soloist in a group of drummers I saw play at a friends wedding one day. His all around knowledge of his culture's music and rhythms was mind boggling! His skill level and demeanour was more like that of a man in a boy's body.

mrclave wrote:the late great Mohammad Kemoko Sano, 30+ years directing and choreographing for the Natl. Ballet of Guinea, eventually succumbed to diabetes. I saw him play several shows with an amputated index finger on his strong (right side) hand. And he was still light years ahead of just about anybody! Clean and solid sounds, the right notes in the right places, and every trick in the book for connecting with the crowd. After one show, he even gave a speech in french to an almost entirely english-speaking audience, and got a standing ovation! ..... Mind boggling performer, artist, human being...

Nice... My thoughts exactly!!