InFocus Magazine

The Fanny Bay Hall is rockin’ out.  Eight women are sitting in a circle in the middle of the upstairs studio, filling the space with the primal rhythms of Africa, and smiling, smiling, smiling.  Even when the women frown with concentration, their eyes somehow keep smiling.  

Brenda, Gail, and Nancy are keeping the mother rhythm going with big, steady, satisfying whacks on their big Djembe drums: do da ga do da gi, do da ga do da gi…  Jody, Diane and Erna are laying down a top beat, their hands flying between middle and edge of the drum.  Anke is creating the pulse on the dunduns, tall cylinders that provide the bass and give cues: boom ba da boom ba da, boom ba da boom ba da.  

Monica Hofer is at the tall bass drums, calling out encouragement, her whole body bouncing to the beat all the while.  She puts down her sticks and bops over to her Djembe, looks around the circle, gathering everyone’s attention as if by magic as she plays the universal beat—the signal that something is about to happen.  In unison, everyone switches to the same beat.  With everyone playing together, it feels as if the whole room is one big drum.  The beat gets faster, the women’s hands fly, the energy gathers.  Then Monica calls out, “Now!” and it changes again: Boom-boom, boom-boom, boom! Boom-boom, boom-boom, boom! Boom-boom, boom-boom, boom! Boom-boom, boom-boom, boom! Boom-boom, boom-boom, BOOM!  And it stops.

The silence is full, palpable, vibrating, and then broken as a few women give out big whoops of joy and the room fills with appreciative laughter.  

It’s not hard to understand why Union Bay resident Monica Hofer loves her profession as a drumming teacher.  As well as running ongoing drumming classes, like the one described above, at a number of Comox Valley locations, Hofer provides drumming programs in schools, leads community drum circles and performs, often with her students, at various events.  In all her work, drumming is a pathway to joy, camaraderie, health and freedom.  

Hofer loves to talk about the many health and social benefits of drumming, pointing out that it has a positive effect on everything from the immune system to employee absenteeism to children’s math ability.  There’s even evidence, she says, that drumming on dogs is good for them! 

But the driving force, for her, is always the power of the experience itself.

“Almost every time I go drumming I have a peak experience,” she says.  “There’s something beautiful that happens every time.  There are always the ear-to-ear smiles.  It’s so lovely to be able to bring drumming to people to see the joy on their faces, the fun they are having, the benefits they get from it.  I feel very blessed to be doing this.”

“The reason I drum is that it feels good to drum,” says Gail Peters, a member of the Fanny Bay class described above.  The all-woman group of students call themselves the Drum Divas, or sometimes, the Djembabes.  “It totally takes away my stress and I come out of here energized.”

Drumming is a great way to build camaraderie in a group, says Hofer, and the Drum Divas are a great example.  “They are a fun group, a pretty wild and crazy group.  They love to drum and they’ve gradually built themselves up to be what they are.  They’ve invited friends, and now they’re all friends.”  As well as drumming together every Monday, this group occasionally performs at fundraisers and in settings such as seniors’ residential care centres.  

The power of drumming in groups has been known for millennia.  Ancient societies drummed to raise their spirits, communicate, affirm the unity of the group, scare off enemies, release stress, resolve conflict, honor their traditions, heal the sick, and, on top of all that, have fun.  But in the last thousand years or so, the industrialized Western world has lost the habit.  

“There’s a lot of fear.  People are afraid to dance, to sing, to drum, or do things rhythmic,” says Hofer.  “We don’t do that here in North America, or not much.  Starting from when we’re babies and then when we’re kids, we’re told to be quiet, to sit still, and to walk straight.  But we all need to express ourselves.  Doing this sort of thing opens you up to a whole other world of possibilities.” 

Luckily, it doesn’t take much to recover the lost art of drumming.  

“If you’re alive, you’ve got a heartbeat, and if you’ve got a heartbeat, you’ve got rhythm,” says Hofer.  “That’s what I always tell people who say they can’t drum.  I tell them to start with the heartbeat and go from there.  And if that’s all you can do in the circle, I tell you that you’re giving your energy to the circle and that’s important.  Eventually you will have the courage to do more.”

A drum circle is an equal playing field, she says.  “Everyone feels the same when they start.  Even if there are advanced players in a group with beginners, it’s an equal circle because the people who’ve played longer will play something different from the people who’ve just begun.  You feel very equal and very safe.”  A nice thing about drumming in a group, she points out, is that no one really knows whose drum makes what sound, so you don’t need to feel badly about mistakes.

“It’s fun to watch people come out of their shell and realize they can contribute to the circle,” says Hofer.  

Hofer began her drumming journey by following her daughter’s lead.  About six years ago, she took her young daughter Katja with her to see the local band bigredtruck.  “Katja pointed at [drummer] Brett Hearn and said, ‘I want to do that, mom!’  I thought, oh yes, one of my daughters wants to be musical!   Because I’ve done music all my life.  So right away we went to see Brett and asked if he’d give her lessons.  He said yes.”