On Sunday, October 29, 2023, we witnessed yet another edition of the Silesia Drum Festival, which was organized, as in the previous years, by the Silesia Drum Store at the Chorzów Culture Center. The main attraction of this year’s edition were six amazing drummers. Poland was represented by Paweł “Pawcio” Świderski, while international guests included Gergo Borlai, George Kollias, Siros Vaziri, René Creemers and, topping the bill, Benny Greb. Their performances were simply top-notch, the information they shared with the audience was most worthy of attention, even though the viewers were mostly drummers (also professional ones).
Gergo Borlai is already a world-class player, with over a decade of appearances at drum festivals, workshops and drum clinics, on tours with some of the greatest names in the world of fusion/jazz, as well as in studio. During his performance, he presented some fat grooves combined with a powerful punch and high-speed playing. Actually, one of the questions from the audience was about working on endurance and speed, so the recipients of Gergo’s art clearly noticed that these elements of his playing were perfectly refined (just as all the other ones).
Paweł “Pawcio” Świderski (currently collaborating with Polish pop sensation, Wiki Gabor) really showed his best side. He presented excellent grooves, tasty chops and great sound, and also established good contact with the audience. Obviously, we have another very promising drummer among those who are just settling into the Polish scene. The best review of his performance should be the fact that Gergo did not leave the wings even for a moment after he had left the stage and watched Paweł’s entire performance with utmost interest, at the same time asking our editor Viking questions about the Polish drummer.
George Kollias is a household name, at least amongst extreme metal fans. Already at the venue entrance, one could notice a large crowd of appropriately uniformed extreme drumming maniacs, who were undoubtedly attracted to the festival by George. An interesting fact is that, after presenting all the fast patterns (blast beats, fills, double-bass playing) and the techniques of double-bass playing, the Greek metal god culminated his performance by showing great feel and versatility playing to a funky backing track.
During the interlude, all the attendees could visit an exhibition of drum and percussion equipment and try it out for themselves. The brands and companies exhibited were:
Gewa Digital Drums – The company presented its flagship G3, G5 and G9 electronic drum kits. A new feature was the PRO configuration, which is based on deep shells sized 18″, 10″, 12″ 14″ and a 14″ snare.
Meinl Cymbals, Tama Drums, Gewa Drums, Music Info, Musik Meyer, Diril – The companies offered festival attendees the opportunity to test drum kits, cymbals and snare drums.
Silesia Music Center – The store organized a competition for the fastest drummer at the festival.
Rohema – The company offered its drum-stick range for testing.
Evans – Many attendees crowded the company’s stand, where they could try out the new Sensory Percussion Sound System.
Silesia Drum – The store allowed all the attendees to purchase drum accessories, occasional T-shirts and Drum Shapes jewelry.
Siros Vaziri was a real revelation at the festival. This exceptionally positive Swede quickly established great contact with the audience, presenting excellent technique, feel and groove, but above all, sharing with them his own, original way of planning and implementing practice sessions, especially in relation to fills and grooves. In this way, Siros actually treated the audience members as his drummer colleagues. Finally, he dissected Tomas Haake’s fill from Meshuggah’s track “Stengah” (around the 3 minute and 30 second mark), and then nailed it during a flawless performance of the entire song.
René Creemers is a true painter behind the drum kit. As a rule, he does not use backing tracks during his solo performances. Instead, he focuses on performing drum and percussion compositions. Tuning the toms in fourths and fifths, as well as pressing the heads in with a stick (the sound then goes up an extra second), allows him to diversify grooves (rather jazzy ones) and fills with MELODIES. Believe us, this approach, without the usual chop-based fireworks, in no way made the Dutchman’s show any less exciting. This was evidenced by the loud applause each time the audience picked up on a melodic motif. It is also worth mentioning that the artist was rewarded by the listeners each time he played a tasty fill, of which there were many. Benny Greb started by saying that René is his drum hero. Let this also be a review of the performance by a half of the Drumbassadors duo.
Speaking of Benny… The organizer put the likeable German on top of the bill for a reason. In Chorzów, he confirmed his status and class, both as an educator, musician, drummer and showman. We don’t know how many times we’ve seen him live, be it at clinics (we co-organized one ourselves), workshops, or performances with bands. We only haven’t attended any of the drum camps he’s organized. You can believe us that those performances were different every time, and we were never bored with them, including last Sunday. This also applied to the drum maniacs at the festival, who filled all the rows at the venue and couldn’t take their eyes (and ears) off what was happening on stage. And, as usual, there was a lot going on: amazing, sometimes humorous, performances to backing tracks, witty announcements, engaging the audience in rhythmic exercises, all topped off with a hi-hat solo. There is an anecdote associated with the latter, because Benny saw and heard it about 20 years ago performed by Steve Smith, who heard it 20 years earlier performed by Max Roach, who, in turn, knew it from Papa Jo Jones. The purest instance of passing the baton from generation to generation. Makes you wonder who will take over from Benny…
The icing on the cake was a joint performance by Benny Greb and René Creemers, after which all the stars of the evening tirelessly signed autographs, posed for photos and gave high fives for a good 90 minutes.
The Silesia Drum team, led by Wojtek Węglarczyk, organized the entire event in an exemplary manner. The drum kits set up on the revolving stage rolled in like clockwork, and the sound system was impeccable. Although there were some time delays, the stars of this year’s festival couldn’t praise the organizers enough, time and time again comparing the Chorzów event to various events of this type organized around the world. It was also a box office success once again as all tickets were sold out.
Anyone who has not yet visited the Chorzów Culture Center during the Silesia Drum Festival this year or during previous editions, really ought to do so next year. This festival is already a permanent and significant point on the map of drum events in Europe. We will definitely attend it!
