My name is Larry Rosalez-Lewis and I've been dancing with Agbedidi for seven years. I don't think I would at all be interested in African dance or performing African dance or doing African choreography if I had never been involved in this group. My goal for Agbedidi is to attract a lot of students from all over the campus.
That's what we're doing right now, but I wanna more to see that, you know, you don't have to be dance major, but major from all the campus. It's really beautiful to see how dance in itself just reunites everyone together and how you don't have to be a specific culture to dance a specific style. I like that I'm a part of the West African movement and to see other people as well being able to dance, it just kind of unites us and we just get to enjoy it together. I just remember at the very beginning I saw this as the most fun thing ever. I never saw it as work, I never saw it as a distraction, I thought it was very cool to have live drums that could go forever.
It's a big difference, you know, having live music versus a recording because actually it's a funny thing because with live drumming you actually feel the beats coming from the drums so it actually gives you more lively feeling to it so it's like your body, your body actually wants to move...so if you're sitting down it's like, ewe, you can feel the drums beating against you. The live drummers at the performance this is what every African dream about. If you don't have live drummers, as a performer, like I've been doing this for many many years, if I don't hear the live drummers I won't feel right on the stage, I need to hear live drums so that's why it's important to have live drummers at the Agbedidi show.
To have this experience and kind of some connection with African people, African choreographers, African musicians, African traditions, I think it's just a valuable part of my life and can be enriching for anyone..
https://howtoplaythedjembedrums.com/uf-west-african-dance-group-celebrates-20th-year/
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