[drumline warming up]
- It's entertainment for a lot of people.
[drumline warm-up exercise]
If people want to get an event
started off with a bang,
they always call us.
[clock ticks loudly]
[tapping off] [tap, tap, tap-tap-tap-tap]
[snare drums]
My name is Joey B. Banks and
I am the founder and director of the Black Star Drumline.
[drumming]
When I started the drumline in 2008,
it was really taking a set of drums that were donated to me
to go to a Boys and Girls Club and start this drumline concept.
[drumming]
Another name for a drumline is a battery, a battery of drums.
[tenor drums tuned to different pitches]
We have four sections.
We have a snare drum section.
We have a tenor drum section.
Multi drums, kids play six drums.
We have a bass drum section and a cymbal section.
[drumming]
There are 20 kids in the group.
The age range of the group is 9 to 19.
We're like a hip hop drumline.
Joey B. Banks: Come on y'all. Y'all know it now.
Here we go. Say it with me.
[yelling chant] Black--Star--Drumline!
[playing drums with metal brushes]
- We really have our niche
and we kinda do our style of what drumline is
but at the same time, they're mastering technique.
They're mastering performance.
They're mastering the drums that they're playing on.
So it's a pretty unique arts education experience
as well as a unique performance experience.
[cymbal groove with stick clicks]
You've got six kids come out there and
they all look like a team and they're like exactly synched up.
And they're all just lined up perfectly.
Then they're dancing together
and there's stick work and they're doing visuals.
You know, I mean, it's entertainment.
[solo on snare and tenor drums]
Hey!
The kids have been on very large stages.
From 25,000 people at Life Fest in 2012
to Bucks games now that are 16,000 to 18,000 people.
Probably done over 600 performances across the state.
[full drumline groove]
There's a lot of leaders in the group.
There's a lot of kids excelling beyond the drum.
I think a lot of it has to do with the discipline
and the focus and concentration
and the regime and the work ethic
they've developed through drumline.
[full drumline performs]
It's a great group of kids.
It's a close-knit family group.
We're really... all really pretty close.
They're going to be friends for life.
[rhythmic drumming]