This time of year is usually pretty quiet for us all in MaSamba – with the majority of Summer festivals over, many of the youth services on holidays and a couple of weeks to go before the schools return, a strange calm descends on our office.

However, this is really just a chance to re-group and plan for the remainder of the year, and simply to tidy up a busy rehearsal room.

There are a few interesting projects in the offing, including a showcase performance of our new show ‘Bloco Afro Brasil’ as part of Culture Night in Temple Bar, a major youth drumming project in Clondalkin, funded by the local Drugs Task Force, and our own Samba Night Course, which kicks off on September 14th.

We are also in discussions with our partners on the Community Services Programme about being an active part of a campaigning day to promote the great work which is carried out by the Programme with the help of government funding, on September 10th, and also on the Day of Action for the Arts on September 17th.

We have also bee talking to some of the band leaders from around the country to see if there are any projects we could collaborate on for the coming year, and there has been a few very useful suggestions – next task will be finding some money to make them a reality.

Finally, Simeon is travelling to Nottingham in September to co-facilitate the ‘FutureRoots‘ samba weekend, with his friend and mentor Dudu Tucci – this promises to be an amazing weekend of workshops, and Simeon reckons he will learn as much as he teaches!