The beat of 10 drums filled the Alumni Lounge of the Usdan Student Center on Tuesday evening as musician and educator Toussaint Liberator led a group of Brandeis students in a drum circle. In a collaborative effort by Brandeis Beats and 'Deis Impact, the event Beats of Peace aimed to enlighten students about the power of drum culture and how drumming can be used as a tool for peace.

During the first half of the event, Cynthia Cohen, the director of Peacebuilding and the Arts, a program affiliated with the University's International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life, spoke about how music, and in this case, drums, can be and have been used for peacemaking. Cohen told a story of two drummers, one of the Hutu tribe and one of the Tutsi tribe, both living during the Hutu-Tutsi conflict. Part of the same drumming group, the two traveled together to different parts of Burundi, some Hutu parts and some Tutsi parts. The two took it upon themselves to protect one another when the band performed in their respective ethnic neighborhoods. Their shared identity as drummers were more important than their identities as Hutu and Tutsi, Cohen explained.

In her lecture, Cohen drew heavily from the writing of two of the former fellows in the University's Peacebuilding and the Arts program, Nicholas Kotei Djanie and Lena Slachmuijlder. During their fellowship, the two traveled to Rwanda, Brundi and South Africa to explore the effects of drumming and music on relationships, trust and healing. In their writing, Djanie and Slachmuijlder spoke of the power of drumming in unison-how it acts to synchronize the breath and the heartbeat. They spoke of drumming as an equalizing mechanism and of the ability of drums to open up a nonverbal space for expression and communication. Cohen described how, in peace talks, words are sometimes inadequate for communication. She described how discussions sometimes fuel wars and disagreements, a phenomenon which she called "conflict-habituated discourse," a phrase coined by artist Louise Diamond.

During the second part of the event, Liberator took over, leading an interactive drum circle. He started by telling the story of his humble beginnings when he used to sit in the subway for eight hours a day playing a simple rhythm on a Djembe drum and singing. 

Since then, Liberator's drum playing has gained worldwide attention-he has traveled to places such as Japan, Brazil, Honduras, Puerto Rico and Guantanamo Bay to play with his group, Toussaint and the China Band. Liberator has impressively appeared onstage with renowned performers such as the Rolling Stones, the Dave Matthews Band and John Mayer.

Liberator began the drum circle by talking about the Nyabinghi, a rhythm that, he suggested, is at the root of all rhythms. Liberator noted how the Nyabinghi mimics a heartbeat and connects the drum to life.

He then began teaching the group, in a workshop style, some traditional beats: the Cuckoo from Mali and the Yankadi from Guinea. Liberator would get the circle running with a steady beat and then layer on more complex rhythms with his own drum.

Closing out the event, Liberator added singing to the mix as he started singing gospel hymns while the drum circle continued with the Nyabingi rhythm. Liberator sang hymns including "This Little Light of Mine," Every Little Thing" and one of the gospels that Mahalia Jackson famously sang at the March on Washington-a song that drove home the message of how music can be used as a tool for peacemaking. By the end of the event, I somehow felt close to the other members of the circle, even though I had never met most of them. When the drum circle started, the beats of the drums were not coordinated-each drum, a little bit off from one another, each drummer drumming to his or her own beat.

By the end of the drum circle, however, when the group had been playing for a little under an hour, the drums began to sync and the room filled with a single beat-a communal heartbeat.

"It feels good, doesn't it?" Liberator asked when he looked around and saw the ring of smiles in the final minutes of the drum circle. It did.