About the rehearsals

At these rehearsals, we prepare a 60-minute show. Led by JP Courtney and a team of section directors, the sessions move along at a good pace. Members are expected to practice the material in the weeks between rehearsals.

Rehearsals are held monthly on Sundays from Sept - June 1200-1730. The February rehearsals will be a Saturday and Sunday weekender. We will have a social or gig on the Saturday night.

Held at professional rehearsal studios in Birmingham. Some rehearsals will be attended by our singers and string players. Band members will be invited to be part of any necessary social media groups to share information. Limited spaces are available in each instrument group. Therefore we cannot guarantee that you will get to play your first choice of instrument. But whatever you play there is loads to show you and we will endeavour to work best with your skill set so you get the most from the course. There are loads of great arrangements, rhythms, choreography and songs which participants will need to learn. The result is a very tight, powerful, well-tuned, contemporary bateria.

Past performances include Womad, Glastonbury and Rio Carnival. We are aiming for some large-scale events for 2024 and 2025.

Among other events in 2024, we went to Ireland to perform as part of the St. Patrick's Day events. We also headlined Tambor, a Brazilian encontro in Bristol. We are planning similar and fun events for the year ahead.

Rhythms covered
Samba (done a few different ways), Coco, Quadrilha, Xote, Ciranda, Funk, 12/8, Ijexa, Cabula, Maculelê plus a few of our own rhythm inventions, lots of breaks, stops, calls, responses, songs, choreography and great arrangements. Plus the bonus of being tapped into the wider Brazilian percussion community in the UK, Europe and Rio.