In Central Park, near the Bandshell (at 72nd Street), African drummers meet regularly on weekend afternoons. I worked my way through the dense crowd around them to get to the front, where there were also dancers inspired by the drummers – the energy and spirit was amazing.

Percussion is a visceral experience, so to really appreciate it, you need to hear it live and close up for full immersion. If you visit Central Park, I highly recommend it. In the meantime, you can make do with the video. Like many things in NYC, one finds a concentration and distillation of authentic talent in this gathering of drummers…

New York City is a dynamic place and, like most cities, is defined by activity. I frequently shoot short video clips when taking photos for NYDP. In many situations, it is difficult to really convey an activity with a still photograph, so today I would like to introduce video to the city daily photo blogs (I will do this from time to time as appropriate).

I ran across two guys (Jason Dehenzel and his partner) in Washington Square Park drumming on cans and other objects – not an unusual urban activity, but these guys were GREAT. One said that he wanted to audition for Stomp. So, let the music speak for itself…