Tam-Tams

Thousands of drum players, dancers, vendors and visitors come together every Sunday afternoon throughout the temperate months, occupying much of the open space on the eastern edge of Mount Royal Park. Jeanne-Mance Park (also known as Fletcher's Field), located directly across Avenue du Parc from where the Tam-Tams take place, serves as the city's main outdoor sporting ground. As such, the entire area is generally quite popular on Sundays in the summertime, drawing an exceptionally diverse crowd to myriad activities. The Tam-Tams typically start around 10:30am and continue until sunset. It is not an officially sanctioned nor sponsored event, simply a regular if technically spontaneous event. As such, it is difficult to pinpoint when it started or what motivated the first drum circle.

Milton

.Tam Tam on Mount Royal Montreal Quebec Canada

It isn’t true that no one knows how the drumming on Mount Royal in Montreal, now known as “Tam Tam”, started. I was one of the seven who started this now quite attractive cultural event. Seven of us, around 1979, (not sure of the date) were introduced to African drumming by someone whose name I have forgotten. When he left the city, we rented a space on the third floor of an old factory building located at 33 Mount Royal Ave. On Sundays we continued to practice the rhythms we were taught. I don’t remember for how long we had been practicing when one bright sunny Sunday afternoon, a member of the group said “Let’s go and play in the park.” There was no discussion, no dissent…we all agreed. We immediately packed up our drums and strolled over to the park which was just a ten minute walk away on Park Ave.

We set up in front of the War Memorial and started playing the rhythms we were taught and had practiced. We added to our repertoire, some rhythms Jeremy (a member of the group) and I had created and taught the group. (Jeremy (I have forgotten his last name) and I lead the group. I introduced the group to the idea of playing rhythms within rhythms: While some members played a basic rhythm, the rest played complementary rhythms, and those who had the skill did some soloing and syncopation. The sound was clean, disciplined, orderly, and easily recognized.( (We were lucky...By the time the police showed up a few years after, I imagined the event was too big to close it down. And by the way...There were no fights for over forty years. No one of the original drummers smoked pot while drumming.)

There were at that time, only a few sunbathers in the park. The number has now increased to several hundred...Not just sunbathers but Frisbee players, hula hoopers, hundreds of individuals just having a great time doing the tricks they had invented and some they had learned. On sunny, warm enough Sundays it was a grand party in the park…a great show with a diversity of performers and appreciating audiences. At first, the sunbathers stayed in place…but after a while a few came closer to listen, and little by little, the number increased. Then one Sunday a courageous young lady began dancing to the beats she was hearing…It took a few Sundays before others joined her…soon after, the number of dancers swelled to at least sixty and sometimes more. After a few more years, several enterprising individuals spread mats and displayed beads, wrist bands, ‘baby size’ drums, and all manner of trinkets. As the number increased, to avoid an inevitable fighting for space, the ‘city’ intervened. Now these individuals (now around forty) have to register each week. They are assigned a numbered space which they can occupy without fear of being challenged.

Gradually, individuals bought drums and joined the original seven. I gave weekly lessons to these new drummers. Others on their own, attempted to learn the rhythms they were hearing. This was reasonably easy for some since they were hearing easily recognizable rhythms to follow. But after a few years, two or three members of the original seven went out from the group and started playing among the dancers. This defused and diminished the strength and sound of the basic rhythms. I tried to help these original members recognize that since the basic rhythms would no longer be easily heard as a guide for the growing number of newer drummers to follow, this was not a good thing to do. I was not successful. As I had predicted, the rhythms deteriorated from the original orchestrated and disciplined sound…It became rampant. The ever increasing number of newer drummers, in not hearing recognizable rhythms, naturally thought this was a free for all--Play as you feel...which they did. I didn't like this. The clean sound for me was now "noise".

After a few years of this, there was a radical change. Many drummers (now over thirty in numbers) did not like the idea of being organized and led--They left the group and went off to play in another nearby area of the park where they felt quite free to just play as they felt. I was told, when l tried to re-introduce the more disciplined original sound to new members who did not join the break-away group: Exact words: “I don’t want to learn anything. I just want to do my own thing. Express myself”. Over the years, I have met only two individuals who seemed interested in improving their drumming. But they were both impatient. If they did not learn a rhythm in one or two tries…they gave up. Newer drummers either left to join the breakaway group, or ignored the original group and went straight to the now larger and more popular breakaway group.

One can learn a lot about human evolution-behavior by observing the evolution of drumming and goings on in the park over the years: The fragmentation of the original group; the entropic loss of discipline; the discarding of a leader, the formation of a new group, etc…this is not new: It is history being repeated on a small scale: Start something, and no matter how well intended and organized, entropic disorganizing forces sooner or later will change things.

Our original group lost dancers and listeners. The more energetic free style leaderless, more popular breakaway group attracted more dancers and listeners. The original group lost its clean sound and was eventually displaced...ceased to exist. In expressing themselves, the drumming of the new leaderless breakaway group became a competition…a slow rhythm for them was considered “boring” and eventually speeded up...So the drumming was now about “Who can play the loudest and the fastest.” Sometimes the impulse to play faster and faster could not be supported by the muscles of their hands—the sound becomes so wild and discordant the whole thing suddenly collapses with much laughter. Again, learning from the event: Can a culture a nation survive  its own unrestrained speeding up? Can the world?

Something similar is going on in the world at large. Things have been speeded up beyond our human ability to control or manage (but this is not funny). With no accepted or recognized leader, a drumming session starts when someone (no matter the level of their drumming skills) started a beat. (Politicians with little or no management skills are in a position to lead millions of individuals...Sometimes sending them to death. No surprise things get messier and messier.) Then there are a few individuals with very loud drums, add to the enjoyable mayhem by deliberately beating their drums in a manner you might expect from a little child. The sound they made was deliberately discordant. The idea it seemed to me, was that each drummer  made sure she or he did not follow or rhythmically complemented or showed any respect or cognition of other's rhythms: I assumed, to gain attention, to be heard and seen. ( Again similar to what's going on in the wider world: With increasing population, it will become correspondingly increasingly difficult to be seen and heard. We will see more and more crazy goings on.)

With over forty drummers, each expressing themselves and having fun attempting to play faster and louder than others, I can only describe the drumming I now hear on Sundays, as cacophony, and noisiness.

I also remembered Spinoza’s timeless words: “Everything, in so far as it is in itself, endeavors to persist in its own being…” For many drummers, there could be in those moments, like no other time, a fleeting feeling of being themselves. I was also able to adapt through recognizing: Some enjoy ‘disorder’ as much as I like order.

But then: as mentioned "What is noise for me is great fun for others". Drummers, dancers, and listeners were all having a great time. It took me quite awhile to realize and accept: These drummers were having the time of their life.

Something similar is going on in the world at large. Things have been speeded up beyond our human ability to control or manage (but this is not funny). With no accepted or recognized leader, a drumming session starts when someone (no matter the level of their drumming skills) started a beat. (Politicians with little or no management skills are in a position to lead millions of individuals...Sometimes sending them to death. No surprise things get messier and messier.) Then there are a few individuals with very loud drums, add to the enjoyable mayhem by deliberately beating their drums in a manner you might expect from a little child. The sound they made was deliberately discordant. The idea it seemed to me, was that each drummer made sure she or he did not follow or rhythmically complemented or showed any respect or cognition of an other rhythms: I assumed, to gain attention, to be heard and seen. ( Again similar to what's going on in the wider world: With increasing population, it will become correspondingly increasingly difficult to be seen and heard. We will see more and more crazy goings on.)

With over forty drummers, each expressing themselves and having fun attempting to play faster and louder than others, I can only describe the drumming I now hear on Sundays, as cacophony, and noisiness.

I also remembered Spinoza’s timeless words: “Everything, in so far as it is in itself, endeavors to persist in its own being…” For many drummers, there could be in those moments, like no other time, a fleeting feeling of being themselves. I was also able to adapt through recognizing: Some enjoy ‘disorder’ as much as I like order.

But then: as mentioned "What is noise for me is great fun for others". Drummers, dancers, and listeners were all having a great time. It took me quite awhile to realize and accept: These drummers were having the experience of their lives. For the first, and probably the only time: They were experiencing freedom. They were doing something their way...Just the way they felt. My way of playing the drum in a group, was my way...Not the only way.

After about fifteen years or so, a group of drummers playing Cuban rhythms appeared, set up, and started playing about a hundred meters away from the original group. Their drums were “Congas” and “Timbales”. (The African drums were “djembes”...different shapes producing different sounds.) These early Cuban drummers were as disciplined and as clean sounding as we seven sounded at the start. They wee musicians. I joined this Cuban group and learned to play along following their “Latin American” rhythms. I did not introduce any of the rhythms I knew. But it did not take long before they also suffered the same fate as the first seven.. New drummers came along, and as happened to the original seven, they made no attempt to learn or follow the Cuban rhythms -- They introduced their own individual rhythm...And incredibly, unbelievably, with much disrespect, they even set out to lead this group of skilled musicians. It wasn’t long before the original clean sound disappeared. Like the first group of seven, the sound was lost. The original good drummers stopped coming. I also stopped playing with this new noisy group. (Well…I thought it was quite good while it lasted (playing with the original group).

I am the only one of the original seven who continues to go to the party….After a few years, the others had stopped coming: They could not listen to what the drumming had become. I still go to the park---but mainly only listen and observe: So much to learn from just observing. I play only when every now and again there is a cleaner, more recognizable basic rhythm: But this coming together goes on only for a few seconds. It was not valued as anything special…the free for all prevailed. I am able to adapt (to some degree) by shifting my attention from focusing on quality drumming, to observing and learning somethings about evolution as general, and the diversity of human behavior, interactions, and values. I enjoy watching drummers, dancers, and listeners having a great time. The dancers and listeners vigorously applaud at the end of each drumming. They are highly energized by the fast, furious, exciting, and very loud drumming—I recognized that what for me is chaotic sounding drumming…is my problem, not theirs. The applause at the end of a session is great feedback for the drummers…A message that whatever, however they are doing, is OK. So carry on—no need to change. I realized that their free style of drumming cannot be improved: That’s how they enjoy and want to play.

I enjoy watching little two year young ones discovering dancing and having fun. Now and again there will be one that even at such an early age find a rhythm to follow.  I also remembered Spinoza’s timeless words: “Everything, in so far as it is in itself, endeavors to persist in its own being…” For many drummers, there could be in those moments, like no other time, a fleeting feeling of being themselves. I am also able to adapt through recognizing: Some enjoy ‘disorder’ as much as I like order. I also remember what my grandmother would say about the kind of sound I was hearing…”Making a joyful noise unto the Lord.”

BTW. Re. Spinoza’s words: As a race “We face an enormous challenge”. I wonder: What will the human world be like if more and more individuals feel that to persist in their own being, they have a right, they are free, to express themselves…Do as they like, and do their own thing? The piece was written before the pandemic. Now I see a bit of what I imagined from Spinoza’s words. Millions of people are infected. Thousands are dying. Jobs lost…A great deal of misery…Many feel it’s their right to do their own thing…They should be free to wear, or not wear a mask, have their party, go to the beach, stand where they feel like standing, etc. (I thought: It cannot be a right for some to put other lives in danger.) Sad.

But: Come and visit the Sunday Summer "Tam Tam" on Mount Royal in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is now a tourist attraction. Probably the only kind of people spontaneously coming together event, in the whole world.

Drummers near base of the Cartier monument.

Spending Sundays in Mount Royal Park has been popular since the park was inaugurated in 1876, and the nature and design of Fletcher's Field has always made it a popular spot for picnics and sunbathers. Musical performances have been a staple since time immemorial, as brass bands, military and marching bands were popular entertainment until around the time of the Second World War. Moreover, the location of the Tam-Tams isn't too far from where Montreal's first permanent exposition hall, the Crystal Palace, was located. As such the location of the Tam-Tams is well rooted in the history of Montreal public life and festivities.

Anecdotal evidence suggests the first people to begin regular drumming at the base of the Cartier monument back in the mid-1960s. A group of students from the West Indies who lived in the area arranged to meet at the monument and practice in a public place to avoid disturbing their neighbours.

However, alternate anecdotal evidence suggests more recent beginnings. Quoted from an Ottawa-based musician and educator: "...1992, it started with four ceremonial guard guys (me included) meeting up to buy pot from some guys we met at Steve's music store. They were buying djembes and we had just attended a clinic with Memo Ascevedo, and bought traditional go-go bells, tambime (not tambourine), clave, talking drum, etc. He had a Cuban buddy who played bongos, and we met at the statue to exchange rhythmic ideas. We shared an apartment on l'esplanade with 6 other army guys, all drummers. 3 of us were on leave at alternate times, 6 days of work, 3 days off. So there was always someone at the house. We agreed to meet every Sunday at the park, get high, and jam. Other guys started coming, it watered down the quality of the jam, but it got bigger and bigger..."

But it would be many years before the Tam-Tams became an element of the Montreal counter-culture scene. In this respect, anecdotal evidence suggests the Tam-Tams' origins date back to Saint Jean Baptiste Day 1976 when the City of Montreal located festivities related to the day entirely within the 'mountain domain'. In this case the mountain became a playground for the city's youth and counter-culture, with music throughout the day and many bonfires throughout the night. Damage to the park was so extreme the city would never again use the mountain for large-scale organized festivities.

Today's Tam-Tams are still centred on the drum circle, but have evolved to also include artisanal vendors, DJs, performance artists, exhibitionists and a battle-royal for fantasy role players.

Because of the 'laissez-faire' attitude that characterizes the festivities, drug dealing, drug use and public drinking are tolerated to a degree. The Tam-Tams is strongly associated with cannabis culture, and though Montreal police are generally present they tend to disregard consumption of alcohol and cannabis. The general rule observed by Montrealers and respected by the police is discretion, moderation and not consuming in view of children.

• Drum circle
• Hand drum

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tam-tams du mont Royal.

• Online documentary Tam Tam Montreal: Sunday in the Park, CITIZENShift
• Tam Tams! – A short film