Feb 17: Swamp Guinee at Freedom HS
Swamp Guinee facilitated an assembly-style visit for the high school students at Freedom as part of their Black History Month and Black Lives Matter at School Year of Purpose participation. After kicking off the visit with a demonstration of a medley of various go-go beats on his drum kit, Guinee launched into a lesson on what role percussive instruments like the drum have had in Black history, spanning centuries. He also drew parallels between the types of instruments and beats in different genres of music, noting some of their shared origins on the African continent. After guiding students through some of the history and asserting that go-go music is the official music of D.C., but has plenty of significance in the region, Guinee invited students with some music experience onstage to play a simple go-go song for their schoolmates. The students were taught a simple pocket beat to play on various percussion instruments, and Guinee led them in a call in response to the chorus of Nas’s “I Can.”
