Drumming for Peace

The Johnson City Press wrote a nice article about the Drumming for Peace event at Sycamore Shoals in Elizabethton. Many First Presbys were there. We hope to schedule more of these events. I am starting to get into drumming and I find it to be a powerful ritual.

Drummers beat for peace at Sycamore Shoals on Sunday. (Dave Boyd / Johnson City Press)

By Rex Barber
Press Staff Writer
rbarber@johnsoncitypress.com

ELIZABETHTON — The timed rhythms of two dozen drummers echoed throughout Sycamore Shoals State Park on Sunday evening.

These beats had a purpose, though — peace.

The drummers did not simply want, nor did they promote, an end to the fighting in Iraq or any other conflict on this Earth.

They sought peace in all things.

Susan Elaine, one of the organizers of the Drumming For Peace event held at the park Sunday from 4-6 p.m., said it was not a protest, nor a demonstration.

“Well, a few of us got together because we are interested in the idea of peace,” she said, drum beats echoing behind her. “We’re about global harmony, saving the earth, people living well together, sharing their resources. So it’s really, for us, an effort to bring up the topic of peace more than resisting war. It’s really bigger than that. It’s a much bigger thing about people working in harmony together to bring about things for the whole world. So that was the primary motivation.”

Why drum for peace? Elaine asked the crowd that had gathered in a semi-circle out behind Fort Watauga.

To answer that, she read from a prepared statement.

“We cannot achieve peace if we are not conscious of the world around us,” she said. “Drumming in community encourages us to listen to the rhythms within ourselves and to those rhythms surrounding us.”

She went on to say that drumming does not necessarily symbolize peace, rather, it fosters communication.

“The drum is a powerful thing because it has a rhythm,” Elaine said. “And one of the things we were thinking about is when people’s rhythms are harmonious they work better together than when they’re in disharmony. So the drum is simply a way to get together, to be in community, to raise one another’s awareness and do it in a way that brings about a great rhythm, so not that the drum has anything to do with peace so much, it’s just one way that we’re coming together as a community.”

One of the other organizers, Nancy Barriger, said she received a call from a man who regularly participates in historical re-enactments at the park who told her that he would never again come to Sycamore Shoals because the peace demonstration she was organizing was disrespectful to the armed forces.

Barriger said that was simply not true, because it was not a protest. The man hung up on her before she could reply.

“What I was going to say to this gentleman was, ‘Don’t the soldiers want peace?’ ” she said.

Several drummers who showed up voiced concern that they would be perceived as protesters.

One drummer said he thought the world would be a much better place if people could get along, but before that could happen, inner peace had to be achieved.

He also said all the wars across the globe are unjust.

“It’s war on the innocent people of the world,” he said, pausing from his drumming, the evening shade waning.

“It’s not just in Iraq, everywhere there’s a conflict in this world innocent people suffer.”