The students found their seats Friday morning as sharp, rhythmic drumbeats resonated live from the front of the auditorium.

As they changed their normal walking pace to match the cadence of the drums, it was easy to see that the eighth graders at John Yeates Middle School enjoyed what they were hearing.

Drummers Kenny Lewis and Jairod Barnes played Friday morning as a presentation of African music and pastimes in honor of Black History Month.

After playing for the students as they entered the auditorium, the guys took time to show off each of the drums and explain how drumming was a communicative tool in Africa. It was a way of welcoming company, as well as signaling war.

“We say music is a universal language; so is drumming,” Barnes said. “That’s what they do in Africa.”

After playing different beats and songs, the drummers brought up volunteers from the audience to try out differing drums and percussion instruments to create a loud chorus of sounds.

The drummers, however, were just part of the presentation for Friday morning.

They traveled along with their classmates in the Hampton University Terpsichorean Dance Company to perform for the students.

Before the dances were performed, the company’s director, Beverly Duane, gave a brief history of the important role Hampton University played in the black community throughout the school’s history. The school was founded in 1868, as the Civil War was ending.

Its goal would be to give black students an academic outlet. Before its founding, black students did not have the same educational options — and, therefore, career options — that white students did.

“I’m proud to teach at this institution with this history and with these students,” Duane said.

The company, which has 35 members that travel up and down the East Coast to perform, had six dancers performing numbers choreographed by the company’s members. Included in the performances was a number specifically created to show the importance of saying no to smoking.

The American Cancer Society has endorsed the number, and the ACS has paid for the troop to travel to a dance show in late April just to perform it.

For more information on the dance company, visit http://www.hamptonu.edu/academics/schools/libarts/health/TERPS.htm.