Africa: Ceremony, Song, and Ritual

By Robert W. Smith

In my first year of Honour band in the Hastings Prince Edward School Board, we first got the music for this, yet our conductor did not even want to try it. Big Loss for him I'd say. The past year was my second year and we played it. Though...

the percussion is the glue that holds this piece together, it took a fair bit of practicing for the glue to stick. It only took two days of rehearsal on the percussion's part to get it down. The full rehearsals and performance were astounding. Best Percussion song I've ever played. If you can find a better one, I'd love to hear it.

I am currently playing the piccolo part for my high school band. It is really amazing since I can now play a high G. This piece rocks. Watch it on YouTube.

Im playing the tuba part in my wind ensemble and the whole band is having a great time playing this song. We are lucky to have such a good percussion section because getting the groove right is hard in this song. It is definatly my favorite song that i have...

played in band and i am sure that it will remain that way for a very long time

I am playing piccolo in this piece with my Wind Ensemble at the Merit School of Music and this piece blew me away when we first sight read it. It's extremely challenging to get percussion going right, however once you get the changes down, everything flows wonderfully. It's...

extremely dramatic, with this great fanfarish introduction and the contrasting sections segue great with the percussion interludes. The band even gets to sing! This is a great piece to learn to develop independence with the winds because you CANNOT count on percussion, the rhythms are too complex. Overall, this is a great challenging piece.

I played this in high school as a Piccolo player at Bayside High School and saw it performed on the field as a marching band favorite! I loved it then, I love it now!!! My kids even want to join band because of it!