[Music]
Wow Wow Wow yes thank you
bueno um break the box this is kind of
what I’m going to be talking about today
and I want to explain to you guys a
little bit what I mean by break the box
so I grew up in a house where my parents
gave us a lot of freedom always
encouraged us to do what we love to do
what we are very passionate about so I
never really had any pressure on me to
go the conventional ways of life which
I’m really happy about so it’s kind of
like I’m still a child playing music
playing the Box like a little monkey
here on the stage for you guys that’s a
joke you supposed to laugh now so anyway
this long story short I grew up in South
Africa then I moved to London when I was
18 and I wanted to study I’m gonna take
this and fur coat off for it’s not a fur
coat please do not kill me but I moved
to London when I was 18 and I really
wanted to study music in very prominent
jazz school there was just a one problem
I had no money to go and study at this
school and on top of that I had to also
make money to kind of support myself and
help my parents they’ve also just
immigrated to to London so I had to
start playing music on the streets
busking I couldn’t get a job at this
stage because I was supposed to be a
dependent on my parents so I wasn’t
legally allowed to do normal regular
work and jobs and actually I’m really
happy to say I’ve never done I’ve never
worked for anyone in my life I mean
obviously I get hired out to do work but
I’ve always been my own boss
and that’s something I’m very glad about
and it comes from the fact that I’ve
always applied the principle of break in
the box in my life and I believe that is
the key to set free what you are meant
to do and what you love to do and that’s
when you’re actually going to change the
world and change your own life and
inspire other people to do the same
thing and do the things that they’re
supposed to do anyway so I started
busking on the street this was a bit of
a box for me to break coming from South
Africa playing on the street you have to
just set up in the middle of nowhere
very scary I started with a saxophone
then I met a guitarist and
did a duet I was singing he was playing
the guitar and about a year later every
day singing on the streets of London
learning and so on and so forth I got a
lot of pain on the vocal cords so I had
to do something about this and this was
when I was introduced to the Box the
Cajon which is what I’m playing here
today for you guys which is also one of
the big reasons why I am on this stage
and why I’m doing what I love to do the
guitarist I was playing with was also
very much into flamenco and Latin music
and I had a lot of exposure to that at
that stage which was really great I
never had that opportunity in South
Africa and he told me about this box a
box like a drum kit in a box at first I
I laughed at him and I thought he was
joking but he was serious so this was
about when I was 19 about 10 years ago
then I got introduced to the Cajon so he
bought make a home from Spain and I got
thrown into the deep end with this with
this box I had to just start playing on
the streets on an instrument that I
never heard of before in my life and at
that stage nobody was playing the Cajon
in London it was very very new it was
still mainly used in the flamenco music
and I had no teacher either in London so
I kind of just had to figure it out
myself so again another box something
very uncomfortable that I had to kind of
break but usually it’s when you’re in a
really uncomfortable situation that you
end up finding the solution for
something which is actually something
that breaks open something greater had
you not been in that uncomfortable
position if you guys know what I mean
I’m sure you all are very very familiar
with this concept so basically a few
years later I added up a few videos on
YouTube in the hopes of helping somebody
else who found themselves in the same
situation where they could learn some
lessons from me I didn’t know much about
the online world YouTube was very new so
it was my surprise that people really
reacted well I got a lot of followers
it’s still growing up to the the fact
that today I see over 70,000 subscribers
on my channel which is really great I
have the biggest Cajon YouTube channel
yay that’s really nice and it’s still
growing and I’m going to bring out a DVD
modern method for the Cajon hopefully
introduce this to schools and education
systems that would like to have a
formalized method for the Cajon
our western world because there is a lot
in the places where it came from which
is what we’re going to talk about in a
bit but there’s not so much in the
Western world so as you can see
throughout my life I’ve always kind of
found a way to do something different
than other people and it’s brought me on
to a point where I’m doing exactly what
I want to do in fact if I was a kid now
to look at myself today I would be quite
happy I’m not bragging about myself but
just happy with where I am because I’m
able to play my music and do what I love
to do and share with people something
exciting and interesting in a very weird
way which I never thought would actually
happen anyway a few years went by last
year the world saw the first hybrid car
horn launched and I got the great honour
I got an email from them they asked me
to be the International artist for this
product which was really great because
this is the new movement and where
they’ve added in electronic sounds onto
the Cajon and taking it even further and
then also last year there was this viral
video that happened which was also quite
an out-of-the-box moment and it’s funny
how one moment where you let yourself go
and you bring out the passion that you
are so happy about ends up resulting in
you getting 70 million views in five
days that’s pretty crazy
so yeah that’s basically where we’re at
now and now I’ve got TEDx I’m on the
TEDx stage which is also another box so
as I’m talking to you about breaking a
box I am breaking a box and four years
ago I watched my first TEDx video and I
thought I’m gonna do that one day I’m
going to be on a TEDx stage so today’s
the day so that’s yeah thank you all
right but I want to explain to you guys
I’m not too long not too long we’re not
in the end yet okay all explain to you
guys a little bit of the concept of
breaking the box by by just using an
actual box to explain this to you
now the Cajon itself I don’t know how
many of you know about it but it’s still
growing it’s very new but we see a world
where 80% of our work around 80% of the
percussive sales are cons every store
you go into has cones and in the store I
mean not everyone but generally
thousands of people are starting to play
music for the first time or getting back
to music because of the Cajon because of
its simplicity because it’s something
that’s free and easy to play
and we have of course millions of pounds
and companies and people making a lot of
money from this as well so it creates a
lot of jobs creates a big market for
people and I want to take you back to
where it actually all started and just
to show you like how one person who
thinks outside of the box or sees more
than just a mere box could actually turn
things upside down that well someone
like me can be on the stage right here
today because of that so I’m gonna take
you guys right back to where it started
the cajon was born in their room in
south america so a lot of people don’t
know this but it was born in Peru and
the way it was born was really beautiful
it was also a bit of a thing basically
when the Spanish colonized Peru the the
they kind of prohibited the drums of the
African slaves in Peru as a way to break
their spirits to oppress them again put
them in a box and so these guys were
found all our drums are gone we can’t
express our soul I mean you come from
Africa those stages all you had was your
music and so to make a long story short
these guys ended up playing on mere
boxes that they used that they were
working on to pack fish and fruits and
vegetables into the boxes so this is how
the cone was born just out of kind of
standing up against somebody who wants
to oppress you and put you in a box so
I’m going to show you guys the peruvian
cajon because it’s slightly different to
hey this is a peruvian cajon i mean it’s
a little bit small i had limited baggage
today so i mean yesterday to bring over
on the flight but they’re they’re
reasonably be larger they’re about that
size but this is a smaller one but it
will give you an a good idea of what it
sounds like and it’s just a box okay
it’s a hollow box with a little hole in
the back really cool really easy you can
imagine there was a bunch of fishies in
here and after your long day of working
this is what came out and that’s how it
was born basically just from that and
then the cajon had its next journey
which is the Kahuna was sitting on it
made its way to Spain to the flamenco
music there was a great guitarist called
Paco de Lucia the boss some people would
argue about that who went to do a
concert in Peru and somebody gave him a
mega Cajon because a peruvian cajon
because a few years after this it became
the national pride of peru so if you go
to peru today they are very proud of
their Peruvian Cajon it’s part of the
whole society is a huge international
Cajon Festival I was there last year
which was amazing to do some workshops
and it’s just beautiful to see 5,000
people get together outside each one
with the Cajon and everyone playing
together and I think it also brings us
back to where we’re supposed to share
music with the community and it’s not
just about the soloist on this page
which is something that we’ve started to
accept what music is about in our
Western world but we forget that music
is about community each drum plays its
part in the whole of the piece of music
and I believe that everyone is supposed
to do music it’s an international
language we have it inside we want to
bring it out and we used to do that but
now we sit at home and watch TV instead
of sitting around a fire
making music and doing beats together so
the tone is bringing a lot of that back
into the world all right going back to
changing is a bit stranger than my
little dress as well was taken to Spain
by this flamenco guitarist they added
strings to the front board so there’s
two guitar strings on this side two
guitar strings on the side against the
wood to kind of make it more suitable
for the flamenco music and this was born
[Music]
no no so thank you very much for that
before this before the Cajon was added
into the flow of the flamenco music the
actual the actual rhythm was claps and
the polymers of the feet so this was
really automatically accepted into
flamenco music and then from there the
Cajon ventured from Europe because it
was in Europe more accessible and
because it sounded a lot like a drum kit
bass drum snare drum we started seeing
this yo yeah cuz my milkshake bring all
the boys to the yard you’re damn right
girl it’s better than yours
yeah hey what you gonna do yeah cuz I’m
happy I’m feeling glad I got sunshine in
a bag I’m useless but not for long the
future it’s time that all yeah or bump
up the gym pump it up your why your feet
is stomping and the jam is pumpin look
at here the ground is jumpin so you can
see how a lot of these things have like
it’s really the beautiful focal point
thank you very much all right okay so
I’m going to finish with this really
really quickly there’s been added on
things obviously I told you guys about
the electronics that was added onto the
Cajon as well which now means I’m able
to to do do other things on the Cajon
so I’m playing somebody book on this or
you can go really heavy and do this all
right so basically basically to run up
my whole speech break the box in your
own life and you’ll see some amazing
things happen not just in your own life
but for other people around you and you
could make a huge huge difference in
your life for everyone else so thank you
very much for watching vision thank you
to TEDx thank you guys
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause] [Music]