Young marimba players featured at music festival

The talented young musicians in the Bahuru and Baduku Bands strike their percussion instruments with fierce speed, building upon each other’s beats, and creating harmonic melodies.

Locals had the opportunity to watch these marimba bands play multiple times during the Oregon Coast Music Festival – first through a marimba workshop at Southwest Community College, and then again at a ‘Dance in the Park’ at Shore Acres State Park gardens.

The first marimba performance was held at Southwest Community College’s Umpqua Hall. The free workshop gave participants the opportunity to hear the bands play, learn about the group’s history, and even play along with members of the band. “Our organization is a community organization,” Musical director Walt Hampton told participants at the marimba workshop. “All of these young people here today are from different schools from the three cities which make up the Tri Cities,” he said.

The high school band is called Bahuru and the middle school band is called Baduku.

Many of the musicians in the marimba bands stick with it for years. In fact, one of the senior high school band members started learning to play marimbas under musical director Hampton when she was only in elementary school.

Hampton said he doesn’t teach his band members how to play songs with written music. “It's like a big garage band,” he said. “A lot of good adult musicians can't decipher what these rhythms are. But kids, especially kids, are capable of playing without too much trouble,” Hampton said.

The Bahuru and Baduku Marimba bands performances were sponsored by the Oregon Coast Music Festival.

The 2024 Oregon Coast Music Festival featured a large variety of musical performances taking place in Coos Bay, North Bend, Charleston, and Shore Acres from July 13 to 27.

More information about the Oregon Coast Music Festival and its’ featured performers can be found at www.oregoncoastmusic.org.