Tutorials and Workshops

Drumming Using Found Objects

Early in the pandemic, when kids – and their parents – were bored and frustrated from being cooped up at home, I created this video showing how they could have fun drumming on ordinary objects found around the house. I also demonstrate what the djembe and snare drum sound like.

A magical performance of my drumming with mindfulness workshop. This was the culmination of a three day workshop held in 2023.

Performances

Jazz trio peformance of “There is a Balm in Gilead,” featuring John Lee on guitar and Topher Dunne on bass, from January 2023. For my solo, I “sang” the melody on the drums.

Free improv with Pat Wictor on guitar and Shirley Mier on piano and melodica. Nothing was planned beforehand, except committing to support each other in whatever might happen.

Overdubbed Recordings

Virtual drum duet, recorded in 2020, featuring multi-miked drum kit and overdubbed djembe.

I used a spaced pair of Audio Technica 4050 mics as overheads on the drum kit. Other mics used were a Shure SM57 on the snare, an EV RE20 on the kick, and a Neumann TLM103 on the djembe.

Virtual percussion septet, created as a tutorial video for an online drumming workshop I gave in 2021.

I used a spaced pair of Neumann KM184 mics as overheads on each track. The kick was recorded with a Sennheiser e945.

Live Recordings

Djembe with Hihat solo. Recorded live to 2 track August 5, 2023
Fred Katz