A raw log Amadinda, similar to those that will be built and played during the Wiscasset Art Walk. Courtesy photo
The Wiscasset Art Walk tradition of making community art continues from 5 to 8 p.m. Thursday, July 28. Musicians and woodworkers will stake out their spot on the sidewalk to make percussive instruments for visitors to play.
Instrument maker Jim Doble of Union will bring the necessary materials to build an Amadinda, a traditional xylophone-type instrument of the Baganda tribe of southern Uganda. While a Ugandan instrument is made of hewn logos laid out on banana leaves, Doble has modified his Amadinda design to use available materials, for ease of playing and portability.
“My Amadindas are played by people of musical backgrounds ranging from 3-year-olds to world class percussionists,” Doble says on his website. “They are well used in music therapy and immensely popular in children’s museums.”
For the Wiscasset Art Walk, Doble will make an Amadinda from raw logs, which he says has “surprisingly good tone.”
In June, Jim brought two of his propane tank instruments to the art walk – a mushroom drum and his yellow submarine.
Woodworker Rick Burns and musician Steven Almasi, both from Wiscasset, will be focused on the cajón, a box-shaped percussion instrument originally from Peru.
The player sits on the top of the drum and slaps the drum’s faces with hands or implements. While Burns constructs the drum, Almasi will use his own cajón to demonstrate the many different sounds that can be coaxed from this simple box drum.
Also on the sidewalk, Partners in Education will be encouraging children and adults to assemble and decorate their own rattles, which they can play immediately. Game designer and furniture maker Aaron Weissblum, of Alna, developed the concept and materials. In August, Weissblum will contribute a variety of rattles and rain sticks, which he’s making in his woodworking shop, to the mix of Amadinda and cajón, for a percussive extravaganza in the Village.
For more information about Wiscasset Art Walk, visit wiscassetartwalk.org or email wiscassetartwalk@verizon.net. Wiscasset Art Walk is a program of Wiscasset Creative Alliance.
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