**It wasn't that drums never existed in the USA among African Americans.**

I'm a bit confused by you making this comment to me and it's made me feel slightly frustrated.I never said drums never existed in the USA among African Americans (slaves or otherwise), something I have been very clear about.Furthermore after you already had this misunderstanding before, you eventualy came to the understanding that I never said this and even agreed to what I said about drums being rare amongst black Americans.But now you seemed to have gone back to your former understanding.You said on the "Gaelic is Gospel thread?":

"Blind Will, re-reading your comments I note that you said that "drums were rare amongst black Americans prior to the 2Oth century and quite often banned."I concur with that statement."Rare" doesn't mean it never happened."

Exactly.You understood correctly.Yet after saying this and after I even quoted this statement on this thread (just a few posts back or so), you go back to your former misunderstanding.(Or atleast you give that impression).

Not only did you agree with me that drums were rare amongst black U.S slaves, but the Met Press Article:Drums & the Origin of Jazz" that you gave also agrees:

"While retaining the essential African characteristics--antiphony, syncopation and polyphony--African American music was forced to undergo a major transformation because of the absence of the drum."

This above quote is from the very article you gave me.I don't think they mean that drums were totally absent in slave days (with no exceptions), but are speaking in a general sense.I'm aware that there was a certain amount of drumming amongst black U.S. slaves.I have known a little bit about the slaves Congo Square drumming that you cited (though you gave some details I didn't know before).I have also read about dancing in the streets of New Amsterdam on religious holidays, accompanied by three-stringed fiddles and drums constructed from eel pots and covered with sheep-skins.Dutch family's even joined together with the festivities and danced with the blacks.But when New amsterdam became New York, the English discouraged the practice (This according to the Encyclopedia Britannica that I have at home).

**All that to say that I very much disagree with you that drums were not important in those cultures which enslaved Africans came to the USA.

It's possible that some of the information I have read has misled me.Perhaps I'm wrong to think that "most" blacks ("most" doesn't mean all) came from some savanna area of North-West Africa that favored stringed instruments over drums (which doesn't say that they never used drums at all).The book I quoted suggests "most" (not all) came from areas of Africa that emphasised stringed instruments.But these excerpts from a very controversial article (Muslim Roots of the Blues) seem to suggest a lesser/but still significant number from these areas:

"It's really there because of all the muslim slaves from West Africa who were taken by force to the united States for three centuries, from the 1600s to !800s.Upward of 30 percent of the African slaves in the United States were Muslim, and an untold number of them spoke and wrote Arabic, historians say now.........Drumming (which was common among slaves from the Congo and other non-Muslim regions of Africa) was banned by white slave holders, who felt threatened by it's ability to let slaves communicate with each other and by the way it inspired large gatherings of slaves.Stringed instruments (which were favored by slaves from Muslim regions of Africa, where there's a long tradition of musical storytelling) were generally allowed because slave owners considered them akin to European instruments like the viloin.So slaves who managed to cobble together a banjo or other instrument (the american banjo originated with African slaces) could play more widely in public.This solo-oriented slave music featured elements of an Arabic-Islamic song style that had been imprinted by centuries of Islam's presence in West Africa..."

The following quotes can be found in this larger article from: http://afgen.com/muslim_blues.html

Getting off the topic of drums for now, the idea that any American slave music could have Arabic or Islamic influences may seem crazy.But I did find it interesting when I borrowed a African cd from the library of about 23 songs by different current african artists, that many of the songs showed clear influence of an Arabic/Islamic tinged singing style.But it isn't just Muslim Africans that show some of this influence.And after I read the article I can pick up Arabic things in some blues that I couldn't hear before.I can also hear Arabic elements in the Gaelic Psalm singing that some say is the root of black gospel, which I believe to have some roots in ancient Christian chanting (some of which borrowed from Arabic music, even before the religion of Islam existed).Also Blind Lemon Jefferson who was one of the most influential early recorded bluesmen, spiced his blues with flamenco sounds from Mexican guitarists (a music style rooted in both Jewish, Arabic, and Gypsy music).So arabic music defenitly came into the blues genre in this manner.And considering how much black gospel is shaped by blues, this is relevent...

Hopefully non of us gets to offended with each other, though I think we stirred each other up a little bit.Just a little bit.

Anyway that's my spew for now....