Really good snares, Mum; how Shlomo taught my son and me how to beatbox
Written by CASA NewsLink
Friday, 16 May 2008
Shlomo, beatboxer extraordinaire, is a courteous, cleancut young man with good teeth. This I know because he bared them repeatedly while demonstrating the basic skills of a percussive vocalist - a lip-smackingly resonant “B-uh”, followed by a wide-grinned “T-uh” and the finale of an open-mouthed primal pout “K-uh” - in a masterclass conducted for the benefit of my 17-year-old son and his mother.
This event came about because I thought it would be, you know, “wicked” to take my teenage sons - whose favourite mode of communication with one another is beatboxing - to experience Shlomo and his vocal orchestra presenting the world's largest beatbox choir, alongside a beatbox chorus made up of 40 local schoolkids. On the morning of this Saturday's concert at the Festival Hall members of the audience have been invited to a mega-workshop to prepare them for the finale of the evening gig. Now I have a head start and, boy, do I need one.
