The power of the drum, and making music to a different beat

Black Issues Book Review, May-June, 2005 by Anthony C. Davis

The Beat of My Drum: An Autobiography by Babatunde Olatunji with Robert T. Atkinson Temple University Press, March 2005 $68.50, ISBN 1-592-13353-3

The passing of Babatunde Olatunji in April 2003 went largely unnoticed by the general public. Olatunji, one of the world's most influential music icons, was revered among drummers as one of the bridges between African drumming and its revival in America. Thankfully, at the urging of his many fans and students, Olatunji managed to write his autobiography before he moved on to that great drum circle in the sky.

Cowritten with Robert Atkinson, a professor at the University of Maine, The Beat of My Drum is a long-awaited book for people who love the spirit of the drum.

Olatjunji came to the United States from Nigeria in 1950 to attend Morehouse College. When he graduated in 1954, he moved to New York City and started forming dance troupes. He landed a gig at Radio City Music Hall and from there his career took off. Aside from the cultural centers where he worked and workshops he conducted in Harlem, Olatunji played with musicians such as Cannonball Adderley, Oscar Brown Jr., Herbie Mann, Max Roach, Carlos Santana and Randy Weston.

Drums of Passion became Olatunji's first album as a group leader. This work stands today as a classic for anyone interested in the power of the drum. What makes this an outstanding record was that Olatunji didn't play strictly African rhythms, with African born drummers. Olatunji was able to blend the different styles of African, Afro-Cuban and Caribbean drumming into something new that represented the spread of African culture throughout the Diaspora.

To the recent generation, he will probably be remembered as the man who made drum circles popular. He gave seminars all over America on the healing powers of the drum circle. In this book, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger all testify about how his drum circles have healed them.

The book is intertwined with vivid descriptions of Olatunji growing up in the Yoruba traditions of Nigeria, his early introduction to Jim Crow in Atlanta during the 1950s, his student leadership in the early Civil Rights Movement, his move to Harlem, and his fascinating career as a musician.

He was president of the student body in college. He claims to have documented proof that he and a group of Morehouse students refused to sit in the back of the bus three years before Rosa Parks became famous. He was on the faculty at Kent State University in 1970 during the "massacre" when the National Guam killed four students. More recently, he was the main drummer for the Million Woman March in Philadelphia. With the passing of Olatunji, we have lost not only a musical giant, but also a man who was an integral part of Americana.

Anthony C. Davis, a frequent reviewer for BIBR, is a writer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.