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Online Drum Lessons NYC

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Beginner Drummers Discussion Forum

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this is what it looks like when you enter the Facebook group "The Beginner Drummers Forum"The Group
The only place like it online–The Beginner Drummers Forum–is a Facebook group where beginners can go and ask any questions without fear of being teased or called a “noob.” It’s a safe space for learning and asking for critique of your playing. There truly is no other place like it online.

You’ll find a mix of beginners (most of our members) and more experienced drummers. The more experienced drummers are there for the sole purpose of helping the beginners in the group.

Join us by applying here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/beginnerdrummers

You’ll have to answer some membership questions in order to join, but they’re not extensive and they’re not intrusive.

If you want to, when you apply to join the group, you can also join a beginning drummer email list that sends out weekly emails that are always helpful to beginners.

The Backstory
I was sitting in my practice room and thinking about my drum students–who they were, why they came to my school, and what they were looking for.

It was pretty clear that the majority of them were beginners.

That made me happy.

That was what I had hoped would happen.

I founded BANG! The Drum School in 2009 in the basement of a rehearsal studio in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. I knew right away that I wanted to teach beginners for several reasons.

Reason #1: The Famous Music School Debacle
The first reason was as a direct result of my visit to a very prominent music college several months earlier. A friend of mine was an associate professor there (we’re no longer friends, but that is a story for a different time), and I had taken a trip to visit him.

While I was there, my friend took me around and introduced me to many of the percussion department instructors there. Some of them were pretty famous drummers and meeting those folks was kind of a thrill.

But there was one professor there (no, I won’t name him) who was such a condescending ass**** that I was left feeling disgusted.

It only took that one person to ruin my day. He was incredibly arrogant and clearly judging my worthiness as a drummer. It still makes me angry even now, more than ten years later.

Interestingly, he was nowhere near as famous or as accomplished as the drummers I mentioned who were “name” guys. The so-called “name” drummers were really nice and gave me no funny vibe at all.

When I got back to New York, I thought about my trip. That professor made me feel so unwelcome that it made me realize something important about the business I was about to start.

As George Costanza famously said, “I will do the opposite!”

I decided that my school would literally be the most welcoming and friendly place around.

When people are just starting something new, it’s no surprise that they could be a little anxious. I recalled what my feelings were when I first began learning to play the drums. I was insecure and not sure of my ability or the way forward. I needed a caring teacher (luckily, I had one).

It became really important to me that my school be accessible and welcoming to beginners.

Besides the horrible music school visit and experience, there was another reason that I felt compelled to focus on beginners.

Reason #2: The Drum Teachers in NY Didn’t Care
When I had a look around at the websites and advertisements of the people offering drum lessons in New York City, I noticed that they were all doing the same thing.

They were all offering everything for everybody. All levels of students, all styles. No focus. No niche.

And certainly, none of them had any focus on beginners.

That seemed pretty strange to me. Why would that be the case? It didn’t make any sense to me at all.

Until I thought about it some more.

And then it dawned on me.

Have you ever taken a lesson with a teacher who doesn’t listen to you? Who doesn’t let you play at all? Who tells you about all of the stuff he or she can do and never shows it to you slow enough so that you can actually understand what they’re doing?

If the answer is “no,” count yourself as lucky.

Unfortunately of me, I have had several teachers like that.

I have a theory about why these teachers are like this.

Their teaching is more of an ego trip for them. It’s not about being helpful. They want to receive adulation rather than to transfer important and helpful knowledge and skill.

By the way, it should be obvious, but if you ever come across a teacher like this, run for the hills!

But this leads back to the reason why a beginner-centric focus is so rare.

For these people–and there are many of them–teaching beginners is no fun. What IS fun for them is teaching really advanced crazy stuff that is full of technique and polyrhythms. And I teach some of that stuff too. But I teach it only to people who are interested in learning it; not to beginners who, for the most part, couldn’t care less about that stuff.

As it turns out, it was good that most of the drum teachers in NY didn’t care about beginners, because I did, and they all started to come to my school.

The Online Version of the Beginner Drummer Focus
Now, fast-forward to the pandemic. This catastrophic really did change everything for me and my business.

One of the things that seemed to be true about the impact of COVID on businesses was that if you were well positioned for the future, the pandemic rewarded you. Just look at Zoom or Amazon, for example.

If you were not well positioned for the future, there were crushing repercussions of the negative variety. That’s what I experienced. My in-person teaching business got decimated.

While I was thinking about what to do, I started to explore what was going on in the online space.

The Beginner Drummers Forum was Born
Not that long before the pandemic began, I had started a forum on Facebook so the beginner drummers had a place to talk and get advice. I started to focus more on growing that group and investing some time into it. I wanted to see if there really was a need for it.

It turns out there was.

And just like with BANG! The Drum School, I made sure that I was welcoming and friendly and that everyone in the group was that way as well.

In fact, anyone who was snarky or dismissive got banned immediately. That’s how I maintain the integrity of the group.

The Beginner Drummers Forum is made up of mostly beginners, but there is a healthy dose of more experienced drummers in there who are interested in helping. That makes for a more interesting dialog. Beginners can ask and those more experienced drummers can answer.

The forum also serves as a place where people who are taking my online course, “Drumming for Absolute Beginners” can ask questions about the course or post videos for critique.

And amazingly, it appears that The Beginner Drummers Forum is one-of-a-kind. It’s the only beginner-centric discussion place online that I know of.

So, if you want a place to go where you can get help, join us in the Beginner Drummers Forum. You can sign up here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/beginnerdrummers

 

By the way, you can check out some other beginner drummer oriented content here:

Beginners: Focus on these 5 Things

12 Beginner Drummer Fills

Top 5 Mistakes Beginner Drummers Make

The Gift

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Happy Holidays, everyone!

Here is my gift to you.  It’s a little motivational video that I think can help you.  The mental exercise I describe in the video did–in fact–literally change my life.

I don’t want to steal my own thunder so I’m not going to tell you that much more about it, except that I stumbled upon it when I was going through a bit of a tough time.

My path was not the one it is now.  I was playing drums, but not enough.   I was doing OK, but I thought I could be doing better.

I was making a living, but it didn’t feel like I was flourishing.  It wasn’t clear to me that I was on the right path.

But how was I supposed to figure out what the right thing was?  How would I know what to do?

Are any of you in a situation like this?  Could you benefit from a little help?

Well, that is my gift to you for the season.  It’s a great mental exercise, and it truly changed my life.  You can check it all out in the video. And if you want to jump directly to the part in the video where I explain the exercise itself and how to do it, just go to to 4:12 in the video, which is below.

The Rock Drumming Six: A Simple and Solid Drum Fill Idea

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The other day I was listening to Clem Burke, the drummer from Blondie. He’s one of my favorite rock drummers. The song was “One Way or Another” from the album “Parallel Lines.” Clem goes to town on this song–big 16th note drum fills, a really interesting and muscular drum break–it’s a great drumming song.

Then I went and checked out a live version on YouTube and noticed that live, Clem plays different fills from on the record. And they’re cooler. In fact, I recognized the key fill he uses in the breakdown section that begins at 2:34 in the video (embedded below): it’s RLRLFF.

I’ve put together a little worksheet on PDF with some examples of how you could use the idea (aka “Nasty Lick #124”), including the two main ways that Clem uses it in this live clip. Here’s the PDF: The Rock Drumming Six

Two of the examples, #1 and #3 are very close to what Clem plays. He’s definitely using RLRLFF, but his orchestration may be slightly different, and he doesn’t always use a flam like is indicated in #1 on the PDF.

Here’s how the examples on the PDF line up with the video. At 2:38, 2:44 and 2:50, Clem plays example #1. At 2:54, Clem plays #3. I included two other ideas that use RLRLFF as well (#2 and #4). Have at it and enjoy!

Here’s the video:

Avoid This Costly Mistake When Practicing Rudiments / Hand Technique

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Here’s something I’ve been talking about a lot lately. And it’s because it’s critically important. And it is overlooked in a major way, particularly among beginners.

One of the things I’ve noticed with some students, particularly beginners, is that they think that if they just put in a lot of hours practicing, their hands are just going to magically transform.

I’ve seen this often with the idea of working on one’s “weaker hand.”

There seems to be this belief that spending time on the weaker hand will bring it up to speed with the stronger one. Sometimes I get the feeling that some students believe that it’s all about the amount of time that is being spent working on developing that weaker hand (most often one’s left hand).

But there is a problem with that thinking.

If you want to watch my video on this, you can check out that out below, or if not, just keep reading.

If one doesn’t spend that practice time mindfully; paying attention to the details of the stroke; the physicality and feeling of it; the way the mechanics are looking; how the strokes feel and sound….and have a model in one’s head of what it’s supposed to look like and sound like and feel like….

Without having that kind of mindful method to your practicing, all of that time that you spend working on that weaker hand is very likely going to be a waste.

Even further; beyond it just being a waste, it could actually be detrimental to your playing and technique.

Why is this?

If you spend a lot of time working on your weaker hand and you don’t have a goal; a visual image in mind of what your strokes are supposed to look like, you’re just acting as if you’re blind.

You need to have that image in mind and then you need to be actively working to make the mechanics of the weaker hand MATCH that image by making physical changes that move the strokes toward the “ideal” strokes.

If the above is not what you’re doing, then the time spent practicing can do more harm than good. What can wind up happening is you can make that hand worse by ingraining some incorrect movement or simply reinforcing an already sub optimal motion into that hand’s muscle memory.

So keep this idea in mind.

Time at your practice pad isn’t going to solve your technique problems.

But time spent in a mindful way working towards a goal movement/stroke and making the changes required to move the mechanics towards that goal will help you improve.

Please consider this before “blindly” pounding out some exercises that you believe will help your hands improve.

As one of my heroes used to write, “Nuff ‘Said!”

Sonny Emory Complete Transcription of “Master at Work” Drum Solo

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Every since I first watched this solo, I’ve been obsessed.

It’s masterful. It’s become one of my favorite drum solos of all-time.

I’m guessing many of you might agree.

My friend Tim Buell transcribed it for me. Do you know Tim? Not only is he one of Nashville’s best drummers (and teachers), but he is also a first-class transcribing master.

Anyway, here is the full trancription: Sonny Emory Master at Work Drum Solo Transcription

And here is the video:

Enjoy!

There’s Nothing Wrong with Simple Drumming

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As I get deeper and deeper into the video course that I’ve been creating for beginners, I’ve  been reminded of quite a few things.

One is that even though it’s almost a cliche at this point, the notion of “focusing on the groove” and “playing for the song” really is of the utmost importance.  Truly.  I mean, I’ve always known that, but it took me many years to fully implement the idea into my drumming life and really, deeply understand and believe it.

And the reason that I now fully believe it at the core of my being is simple.

The more I play this way when I play with people, the more I get hired and the more money I make.

Not to mention the fact that I have gotten some over-the-top kind of compliments about my playing that I kind of can’t believe.  You know what I mean about “not believing” it?  That little negative part of my brain thinks, “Jeez, don’t listen to that, they don’t know what they’re talking about,” or “They don’t really mean that. They’re just being nice.”

I hope this doesn’t sound arrogant; I do think what I’m saying could be perceived that way. But, I am honestly just telling you about some things that have started happening in my drumming life since I’ve applied these principles in a deep and meaningful way.

I considered not making the video I’m going to share with you today.  Mostly because of the fact that “play for the song” and “it’s all about the groove” are repeated so frequently by drummers as to have diminished the power and truth of these statements.

But also because the video shows me playing a song very simply. No fancy fills or pyro-technics. I’m just laying it down with a simple eighth note groove.

And then I thought; so what? Does that simplicity make it “bad drumming?” Is its value less than some chops-based odd-time signature progressive rock masterpiece?

The answer is a resounding “no!”

It’s value is clear. The reaction I get when I play that way is dramatic.

And so, the results that I’ve seen in my own life have made me want to put this out there, regardless of what a fusion-loving drummer might think.

So fuck it. I’m saying it.

Here goes: “There’s nothing wrong with simple drumming!”

Ah, it feels good to shout that!

I also had another reason for moving forward and publishing this post and video. You know what it is? The current online world needs to hear this!  

The social media dominated cybersphere puts pressure on musicians (and drummers in particular) to be chops heavy and play complex things in a massive game of one-upmanship.

I think to a certain degree that this online social media environment impacts the choices that drummers make in their playing. And that’s a bad thing.  Because the real world, where you play with other musicians and make music as an ensemble, doesn’t necessarily reward chops all day every day (although it does when those chops are musically appropriate for the situation at hand).

The real world rewards groove.

OK, OK. So, I’ll get off of my soapbox now. You get the idea.

But it needed to be said. Below is a video I made where I discuss this concept briefly and then play-along with a song by MANCIE (a rock band that my wife, Andrea founded and that I am now the drummer for) that demonstrates the notion.

So remember: there is nothing wrong with simple drumming!  In fact, it will get you more gigs and probably make you more money.

Here’s the video:

 

 

Want to Sound Like Keith Carlock? Try This Drum Lick.

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Want to Sound Like Keith Carlock? Try This Lick.There was a good year or so that I was obsessed with Keith Carlock’s drumming.

And who could blame me? Keith has got it all: a killer pocket, chops for days, and a truly unique sound.

There is a particular lick that Keith plays a lot, and I’ve written about that before. You can find a transcription of his “signature lick” at the following link: Keith Carlock Signature Lick Transcription

I don’t really like to play other people’s ideas verbatim, especially when the idea in question is so clearly identified with a particular person. So in this case, instead, I came up with my own way of playing this Keith lick. And that idea–a “spin-off” of Keith’s lick–has remained in my vocabulary since. And I never get “accused” of sounding like Keith Carlock either (although that wouldn’t be so bad, right?).

Let’s get into it, shall we? By the way, if you’ve been following our series of “Nasty Drum Licks,” this one is #133. If you want to check out more, just click here: More “Nasty Licks” Posts.

Below, you’ll find a video where I show you the idea, slow it down with half-speed video, and then give you the transcription within the video. At the bottom of this page, you’ll find a link to download a PDF with the lick on it so you can print it out and work on it in your very own practice room.

Now, here’s the transcription: Nasty Drum Lick 133

Alright! That’s it for today. Let me know this lick works out for you…

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PS – Imagine that you could regularly get these Nasty Licks delivered to your email inbox every time we post one. Great drumming vocabulary to raise your drumming level–free. Go do it–just type your email addy into the form below, and click that button.




A Six-Stroke Roll and a Linear Drumming Idea Walk Into a Bar…

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Welcome to “Nasty Drum Licks” #124 and #125.

The six-stroll roll in this lesson refers to the left-handed version (LRRLLR) and the linear idea is something I’ve been playing for a while now (FLRLFR). I came up with the linear thing as a way to play something kind of slick-sounding while grooving on the hi-hat, snare and bass drum.

The reason these two seemingly unrelated patterns are presented together is that—as you’ll see in the video—they work together really well. It’s very natural to play one right next to the other.

The ideas work individually really well too.

Check out the video and you’ll see what I mean. In it, I play the ideas many different ways; connected, not connected and with several phrasings. Here we go:

Here’s the PDF with all the ideas I play in the video written out note-for-note: Nasty Licks 124 and 125.

There are also two bonus ways of playing them (#’s 8 and 9 on the PDF), that I don’t play in the video.

Check it out and let me know what you think in the comments here or on YouTube.

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PS – Imagine that you could regularly get these Nasty Licks delivered to your email inbox every time we post one. Great drumming vocabulary to raise your drumming level–free. Go do it–just type your email addy into the form below, and click that button.



Nasty Lick 38

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Are you ready?

I am about to give you one of my Nastiest of the Nasty Licks!!! Nasty Lick #38 is one of my favorites. It pretty much ALWAYS gets a reaction. Just check out the screams from the audience when I launch into it in the video below. It’s a live video of my rock band MANCIE playing at Spike Hill in Brooklyn, NY in November of 2011.

Mark Feldman performing with MANCIEIt’s a cool song and the band is great, so check it out. But if you want to go right to the drum solo, it begins at around 2:52 in the video.

I begin with some rudimental type stuff on the snare, work in some hand/foot combinations, and then launch into Nasty Lick #38. You can skip directly to Nasty Lick #38 by going to 3:03 in the video.

The Video: MANCIE, Live at Spike Hill

The Transcription

Alright! Want to know how to do that? Just print out the PDF by clicking here: Nasty Lick 38 PDF

Analysis of Example #1

The lick as played in the video is written out in example #1. The pattern—three groups of five notes–is played a total of five times. I move counter clockwise around the drums, with the first note of each group of five on a different drum: 1) snare, 2) floor tom, 3) high tom.

That accented note is followed by two ghost notes with the left hand and then two fast bass drum notes. Note that at this part of the solo, the time is “free.” I’m just going off, playing the lick a bunch of times and then improvising as I see fit. It’s an open solo, so playing “freely” is always an option. I cue the band to come back in, so I don’t have to worry about the pulse.

Analysis of Example #2

Example #2 is another way to use the lick that I rely on frequently. This time, we play completely in time. In this case, each group of five takes up the space of three 16th notes. I’ve included a measure of accented 16th notes below the lick so you can see how the phrasing lines up. The first note of each group of five lines up with the 16th notes shown below example #2 as follows: 1) the “1,”2) the “a” of “1,” 3) the “and” of “2,” 4) the “e” of “3.” Finally, you can easily resolve the lick by playing an accented note on beat four with your right hand.

Let Me Know What You Think!

I want to hear from you! Please leave comments here on the blog so you can ask questions, give your opinion, or tell me how you are using this lick….

 

 

PS – Imagine that you could regularly get these Nasty Licks delivered to your email inbox every time we post one. Great drumming vocabulary to raise your drumming level–free. Go do it–just type your email addy into the form below, and click that button.



Nasty Drum Lick #128

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Last week I posted a video of my playing along with Gary Husband’s song, “Groove Grease.” There’s an eight bar solo in the song and I’ve been getting asked about one of the ideas I played in that solo. Hence, Nasty Drum Lick #128 was born!

The idea is a sixteenth note triplet phrase that uses a six-stroke roll with two bass drum notes and one tom note thrown in.

Watch the video (it’s only 1:11) and the lick we’re talking about today is played three times beginning at :27 into the video. You won’t be able to miss it because text appears on the screen saying “THIS IS THE LICK” when I’m playing it, and that text disappears when I start playing a different idea.

Here’s the video:

Now, here’s the PDF with the lick written out, note-for-note including sticking:

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PS – Imagine that you could regularly get these Nasty Licks delivered to your email inbox every time we post one. Great drumming vocabulary to raise your drumming level–free. Go do it–just type your email addy into the form below, and click that button.




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