So last summer I was walking on a major street in Toronto where I live and I came across some 60+ people, mostly Asian women, practicing tai chi in the park. In that moment I got to thinking that drumming is very much connected or performed in the same way that tai chi and martial arts are learned and perfected. If you notice someone who is practicing tai chi going through the 200 or so movements in a very slow manner, they are actually connecting their mind and body and getting inside the movement. These people in the park are practicing their tai chi very very slowly, which allows their muscles and body to become one with the motion. It also allows them to be so in tuned with the motion that if they were to actually do these movements real real fast tai chi could become a very violent martial art or just a great way for self-defence (I dare anyone to come up to an old lady practicing tai chi in the park and steal her purse – she’d beat the crap out of you and she could probably run faster than you). One might ask themselves what this has to do with drumming…

When learning drumming, the tendency to rush things and play fast and want to play beyond your ability is very common. We always want to learn it now, learn it fast, without taking the time to play slowly and really be mindful of our physical motions. I feel this can actually slow down the process of learning to play the drums. So many times I have tried to play things fast and had slow and poor results but when I listen to my teacher who says “play everything at extremely slow tempos” I find that when I eventually increase the tempo, after practicing very slowly for a decent amount of time, things work out better. By slowing down I allowed my body to actually get inside the movement or motion of the drumming exercise that I was working on. It’s kind of like allowing your body to accept the feeling of the motions. Telling your mind to allow your body to accept the motions or feelings of the drumming exercise is a concept that my current drum teacher always hammers home.

Another way to look at this is your muscles have memory and it takes time to work through physical motions before your muscles become accustomed to the movements. Nothing illustrates this better than the movie The Karate Kid. For those of you who were kids in the 80’s you would remember this. The Karate Kid was told by Mr. Miyagi (his karate teacher) to wash and wax around 15 cars. He was told to put soap on the car with the right hand and wash it off with the left hand in a circular motion. Then after that was done he was told to wax the cars by putting the wax on with the left hand in a circular motion, then taking the wax off with the right hand in a circular motion “wax on, wax off”. At the end of all the cars being cleaned and waxed the Karate Kid was losing his mind. He had just gone through the motions of committing a movement to muscle memory in a slow and repeated way that took hours but he could not see the value in doing that. The Karate Kid started screaming at Mr. Miyagi, complaining that he felt like a slave and that he couldn’t understand what this had to do with learning karate. Mr. Miyagi then began to throw punches at the Karate Kid and the Karate Kid was able to block these punches with the same motions that he had just spent all day learning while cleaning and waxing the cars. He was blocking these punches with ease and a lot of speed.

Drumming is very similar to this in that let’s say you take a six stroke roll R l l r r L R l l r r L and play it very very slowly with the accents (which are the capital letters) at 90 degrees in height from the snare drum or pad, and play the non-accents (lower case letters) one inch from the snare or pad, this rudiment will sound very solid and have a nice rolling effect. This is hard to achieve if you don’t practice real real slow, allowing your muscles in your fingers and wrists to get inside or connected to the movement of the accents, non-accents, and strokes. You can waste a lot of time by blasting away at rudiments, drum feels and drum beats too quickly and not allowing your body to accept and gain the muscle memory of the physical motions that you’re putting it through.

I just heard about the death of Mitch Mitchell, one of the best drummers ever… In my opinion.

He was one of the original members of the Jimi Hendrix Experience and for those who haven’t heard of him, your missing out on some amazing drumming. This guy was a jazz drummer who fuzed his amazing jazz drumming technique with Rock n Roll. Wikkipedia says that he was the guy that started fusion music (mixture of rock and jazz). I’m not sure about that claim but who knows, It was the sixties after all.

The first time i heard the Hendrix songs “Fire” and “Cross town traffic” which he played on. I freaked out! The drum fills and use of rudiments in his playing blew me away to the point where I started a quest to learn as many rudiments as possible and figure out cool ways to apply them to the drumset. One of the rudiments he liked to use quite a bit was the “Single stroke four”. the sticking is as follows with upper case L being played as an accent (meaning louder than unaccented notes) r l r L the first r l r should be thought of and played as a 16th note triplet starting on beat 1 and ending with the accented L on the “and” or “+” of beat 1 … The “single stroke four” fits perfectly between beats 1, 2, 3, and 4. Each “single stroke four” starts on the quarter note beat and ends on the “and” or “+” of beats 1,2,3 and 4. they would fit in and be counted as 8th notes 1+ 2+ 3+ 4+ . You can use this as fills on the snare or start the fills with the first note on a tom and finishing on the snare…. Hopefully this makes sense to ya’ll…

Have a listen to Mitch Mitchell’s playing and know this… The Jimi Hendrix Experience are now back together again but you gotta die first before you can catch their next show.

RIP Mitch Mitchell….

When I started my drum lesson studio, deciding to make the transition to losing the day job and focusing on passing on my craft to others. I had no idea that there were so many females wanting to learn to play.

I had assumed that because I was male and teaching from my home, females would not be inclined to call me, because of fears of being alone in a studio with a young guy. As well, drumming seems to be a male dominated art.

Man was I wrong…..

I currently have a 75% female student roster and building. So what’s going on girls? Are you finally showing the dudes that you can do it better? or at least as good?

I wanted to find out why I have so many women wanting to Rock! the drums, so I asked all my female students why they want to play and why they chose me over countless other guys that are out there. (By the way, I have yet to see any women teachers out there in web land).

First off a big consensus was that drum stores/shops are a place where women are not treated like knowledgeable thinking people by the mostly male staff. These drum shops can be very intimidating and many females can’t imagine buying/talking about drum gear or taking lessons in a place with this type of atmosphere.

I think drum shops may want to think about the female consumer because that’s who are buying cars, clothes and condos etc…

One thing mentioned was when they called me for lessons they liked the friendly vibe I gave off and my studio was not in some scary warehouse down an alley, or in a dark nasty basement somewhere uptown. Kudos for me. But i think what matters most is when they have a lesson they feel like there is some care taken in structuring and teaching the lesson to their interests and goals as well as being treated with respect and dignity. It’s not about me and what I can do as a player/teacher. It’s about the student, and what they envision for their learning and playing needs.

Two of my students told me that when sourcing out a teacher they were actually being asked out on a date. Crazy!!! and not good. I have a baby daughter and i hope she never has to worry about getting picked up by her piano teacher.

A few of my students said they always wanted to get into a band or they like the physicality of it all but felt they wanted to learn right from the basics and until they saw my ad or website they just hadn’t taken the next steps of finding the teacher buying the drums etc. Another issue, was never before has there been the ability to play in an apartment or condo until the last few years. I mean there has been electronic drums since the 1970’s but they were crappy and expensive. Today there is a ton of electronic drum sets out there by companies like Roland and Yamaha etc that have come out with drums that sound amazing and have sensitivity on the snare and an all around great sounding/feeling set up for learning to play. People are now living out their desire to learn the drums without having the cops shut them down 9pm.

With that said…. (time for me to shut the hell up)

My female students are quick learners eager to learn everything and have the patience to absorb and go through the physical muscle memory motions that is required to play drums…. And play them well. I’m very lucky to be teaching these women because they teach me humility, respect and wisdom as well as patience for explaining things that sometimes are quite difficult to impart. They help me be a better teacher. Thanks so much guys.oops I mean gals…

Look out dudes the women are kicking some major drumming ass!!!!

I’ll include some links to some cool female drummers that are out there.

See ya!

www.cindyblackman.com

www.terrilynecarrington.com

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patty_Schemel

www.drummergirl.com