Drums Not Guns in ArtCar Parade

Many thanks to DNG Board Member, Phil Hollenbeck for having the IDEA that WE enter The ArtCar Parade; Houston members, Steve Colvin, and Renato Elcarin, for building the safety features and doing the legwork by checking out various trailers suitable for our needs; Suzanna Brown for graphic art in logo and banners; Stephanie Nintzel & Brandi Hollenbeck for decorating The trailer and Pepper Mouser, for letting us use his 20' low-boy trailer. Next year will be even better!!!

One of the entries, the Fanatics, driven by Tom Kennedy. Many thanks, Tom, for letting us store our drums in your bus. You see, Tom pulled in behind us, after the 3 hr parade, and let us store our drums while we attempted to figure out "where we were". BTW, little did we know, then, that Tom would WIN Overall Entry. Congratulations, Tom and all your crew. You guys are great!!

Rolling, rolling, rolling. Brandi's riding "Chariots of Desire"

That's downtown Houston in the background

Ilya (foreground), Renato Deaca (green hat), Steve Colvin (blue hat) - Houston Stephanie Nintzel, (middle) - Dallas	Homer Fernandez, Corpus Christi
Foreground, NightHawk - Austin, Andrew Zolnai - Houston	Susan and Mark Wallace - Houston

After the parade, From L to R: Steve Colvin, Renato Deaca and HappyShel	L to R: Phil Hollenbeck, Steve Colvin & Renato Deaca
L to R: Phil & Brandi Hollenbeck, Suzanna Brown and Stephanie Nintzel	L to R: OSuzanna & Stephanie
Sunday brunch at the Orange Show. This is a VW stove. The wood is carried in the trunk, and grill is under the hood. It's towed. Migas is cooking.	It's also Stephanie's birthday, Saturday

What an incredible experience drumming on a trailer in the ArtCar Parade, Saturday !! !!

Drums Not Guns rocked the parade. As we pulled into "line" (we were pulled by Phil Hollenbeck's 'Chariot of Desire'), we were playing Fanga. Across the parkway, was another trailer with drummers & keyboard, with a drum set player. As we got into the 'zone,' their trap player, Ilya, heard our beat and jumped ship joining us to play our dununs. We jammed there for an hour. The parade was slow getting started.

Saturday morning was beautiful, 40 degrees and clear. By 12:30 pm, as we pulled out onto Allen Parkway, downtown Houston was looming in the background, it was 60 degrees. Soon, there were people watching the parade. Before we got there, I could see thousands of people, 4 deep on the sidewalk, watching the parade. For most of them, they were still and in bewilderment as the ArtCars paraded by. When we came into their view, they were clapping, dancing, whistling at us. Out of the blue, I hear, "Happy, Happy" and as I turned, I could see that it was Joyce Cail, a great dancer from Denton, waving and smiling at us. Oh, what a good feeling that was.

The closer we get to Downtown Houston, the crowds begin getting bigger and all of a sudden, we are approaching up the rise to DOWNTOWN. As we pulled in, there were tens of thousands of people - some 10 deep on both sides of the street, people hanging out of parking garages, tall buildings. Our drums sounded great inside the walls of downtown Houston and under the bridges. We rocked downtown with Kuku.

We drummed steadily for 3 hrs, got a nice sunburn on our faces and arms and had an incredible time. It was so nice to hook up with our Houston drum family, Renato, Andrew,Sandra, Susan, Mark and Steve. Steve and Renato did a superb job of rigging the trailer with saftey rope, so that I wouldn't fall off :^).

Sunday brunch was held at the Orange Show for the participants. Flowing coffee, migas and lox and bagels were the treat of the day. Steph, Suzanna and I, found a nice shady spot and drummed Fanga for a while. We were told, later, that we were a hit. We met Sandra L'Herisson from Baton Rouge, Sunday, and she jammed with us. Her friend Paula played dunun and clave.

Many thanks to Neal Wigenbach, host of 90.9 FM, Grateful Dead Show (airs on Fridays, 11 pm to 1 am) for inviting Steve Colvin, Phil Hollenbeck and Suzanna Brown to be interviewed on his show.
Alafia,