Our Mission

To bring hope to others by utilizing the power created when people come together as a community of drummers for the purpose of raising money to support a humanitarian cause.


Our Story and Vision

"Drumming Up Hope"  has grown from the vision of amateur drummer and disaster expert, Richard Ottenstein, after learning about the magnitude of the Haitian Earthquake of 2010. The vision was to bring drum circles together to generate support, awareness and donations for the victims of the disaster. The drumming community immediately embraced the idea. By working together we have created "Drumming up Hope" as a vehicle for bringing drum circles together and to indeed "Drum Up Hope"!

Our premier event will be "Drumming Up Hope for Haiti". The drum circle that we have created to start this was originally scheduled to take place in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, on January 31, 2010, but was postponed due to inclement weather. A new date will be posted online in the near future.. The American Red Cross has joined us as the donor recipient for this event and all proceeds will go directly to the American Red Cross.

We have a created an  online registration form for those who are holding their own drum circle to raise funds for Haitian Disaster Relief and would like to link up to "Drumming Up Hope". Registering with us is solely for the purpose of being able to report to the drum community the full  impact of this effort. There is no cost to register; all we ask is that you use your circle to generate donations for Haitian Disaster Relief. The donations you receive should be given directly to the donor recipient and not us. We also ask that you update us afterwards as to how many people attended, how much money was donated and which humanitarian organization received the funds. 

The entire project has been truly a grass roots effort. Other then the cost of the website listing, no money has been spent by any of the organizers. Only time energy and spirit has gone into creating "Drumming Up Hope".  All donations will be made directly to the donor recipients so that "Drumming up Hope" will not be directly receiving funds.

Our dream is to use "Drumming Up Hope" as a model for future humanitarian efforts.