No lesson this week :-(

I had to cancel tomorrow's lesson because there was simply no way I could be there in time. I'm covering 2 roles at work so that and commuting is taking up all of the time I have. Unfortunately my teacher's policy is not to re-arrange or refund any cancelled lessons - so despite the fact that I was able to give 4 days notice tomorrow counts as one of my current block of 5 lessons.

This is probably a timely event : it has made me realise that it is madness for me to commit money up front to cover a 10-week period with no possibility of rearranging a lesson. I'm simply too busy with work, life and commuting to be able to work within such constraints.

So, fantastic though they have been the lessons are over after the next 3. I'll probably arrange less frequent ones on a one-off basis with other teachers.

:-(

Lesson #6

A hectic fortnight meant that I hardly got on the kit at all between the last lesson and this, so the first step was to review all the new stuff from last time. I was quite pleased that it hadn't completely gone from my mind, but it certainly wasn't ingrained at all.

The rest of the lesson was spent working on further exercises that revolved around triplets either as part of a groove or fill, and usually mixed up with 'straight' rhythms in some way. We covered a couple of neat things that meant you really HAD to have the next pattern in your head (ie they didn't incrementally evolve in a sensible order - the timing felt as though it jumped about a bit) so there was no hiding. Oh, and then the metronome came out again to remind me just how hard this really is.

Again I felt challenged and left with lots to work on.

There was one very positive thing though - my teacher pointed out that throughout the lesson my grip had, for the first time, remained spot on. Those hours on the practice pad finally paying off - progress at last :-)

Lesson # 5

Another 2 weeks already ? Cor blimey . . . that means this was the last of my paid-up-front lessons so time to decide if I stick with them, or go away and consolidate on my own for now. I gave this some serious thought over the last couple of days and decided to keep going. It has been hard to find the time to practice to get the most out of the lessons, but to be fair that necessity has been a good thing in keeping me moving forward on the practice front. And the money : well, money's for spending, and overdrafts are for, err, overdrafting. So onward and upward.

Today we warmed up with some easy singles and doubles, and we talked about how my grip really has come on since last time (the pad practice is paying off ;-) ) and the benefit of doing these things correctly from the outset. Then it was time to play through the 'homework' from last time - namely the 3 bars of 8th note groove, 1 bar fill, 3 bars 16th note groove on ride, 1 bar fill, repeat to fade. Oh and wrong-handed too.

Today's new item was the triplet. My teacher seemed a little relieved that I was at least aware of what this was "...3 notes played in the space of 2 normal notes..." and we set about a simple exercise to get the relative speeds of 8th notes, triplets and 16ths in to my head and limbs. Once I'd grasped this we applied it to a basic groove - with the right hand playing a bar of straight 8th note hi-hat (1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &), then a bar of triplets (1 & a 2 & a 3 & a 4 & a) then a bar of 16ths over an otherwise static very basic groove. Learning to feel the relative pace of each was key. All through this he was noting good and bad posture, stroke technique and all the other good things that keep me on the straight and narrow. This and similar exercises will form much of my next period of home practice.

From that we jumped back to some of my 8th and 16th note grooves from earlier lessons to make sure I'd not forgotten the basics and we then closed with a quick 'game' of copy the beat which rounded things off in a relaxed way.

Drumming versus Real Life

This Blog isn't called Drumming, it's called DrummingDad, so it's only right and proper that some real life creep in, so:

Drumming in a terraced house and with a small child who sleeps in the next room is always going to be problematic. It's especially frustrating if, like me, you're one of those people for whom the evening is when you're most awake and alert (morning people really freak me out - it's just not natural) . This has been a particular problem over the last couple of weeks and has severely curtailed my kit practice.

Fortunately I did knuckle down and put some pad time in instead, and this seems to have paid off as my latest lesson didn't seem to have suffered unduly. So all you folks wiht your sound-proofed playing areas, or kids home alone all day in the holidays, spare a thought for the frustrated bedroom-player who has to fight the urge to let rip at midnight (yes, we're still talking about drumming . . . )

Kit Upgrades

At some point in my very recent venture in to drumming, the old sickness overtook me : gear lust ! This affliction also known colloquially among guitarists as GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome) is something that I know is never worth fighting. So I don't :-)

What it means is that I have upgraded a few things on the kit already. First up was a set of Sabian Hand Hammered Fusion hi-hats. The 'Rock' hats I had were great quality but VERY LOUD and far from subtle things, so I turned them around on eBay for roughly the price I paid and set about finding replacements. These came from Canada (via eBay) and are much more my cup of Decaff Yorkshire Tea


I was still without a crash cymbal, and we were using one (occasionally) in my lessons so that was next - it turned out that the friend who had been offering advice throughout my buying was selling some of his cymbals (having become a Paiste endorsee he has whatever he likes now!) and I chose a nice Zildjian A Custom 17" Fast Crash. It sounds wonderful - quick to react, quick to die away, and with a lovely low complex sound.

Now this was all very well, but what I quickly learned is that cymbals are interactive things - by that I mean that they need to complement each other tonally, and if they don't it really stands out. My crash and hi-hats were no longer in the same tonal-ballpark as my ride which was bright, quite loud, wonderfully articulate but sounding out of place among the low-pitched new arrivals. So to eBay - and this time the USA - where there was a well-used but ultimately very reasonably priced Sabian Hand Hammered Medium Ride. I love it.

The last upgrade was a very fickle one : my hi-hat pedal is a lovely Tama Iron Cobra. Obviously it would be 'best' if I had a matching bass drum pedal. Wouldn't it ? Hmm - why am I asking you I'd already decided . . . ;-) And look - all nicely matching now !

I should point out (particularly in case Mrs DrummingDad happens along to this corner of the internet . . . hello dear :-) ) that all of the things that these new items replace were sold on for at least what I bought them for: that's one of the great things about buying used gear - you're never too much out of pocket and sometimes even a few quid up. What was that dear ? Am I up or down ? Well, I, err, it's a little complicated . . .would you like a nice cup of tea and a sit down ? . . . ooh look a seagull. points. runs.

A more physical approach

In my last post I mentioned how I like to reserve a couple of minutes in each practice session to go wild and just thrash around the kit. When I do this I tend (among other things - including having poor timing !) to play harder and it changes the feel and sound of the kit quite a lot. So today I deliberately played hard all through my practice session - not because 'this is the way I play now' or anything like that but just to see what sprt of difference it made.

I noticed 4 things :

1. It detracted from my right foot - it was getting forgotten and a bit lazy as I was concentrating on beating the drums and cymbals

2. I chewed my brand new 5Bs to pieces ! haha

3. It made the toms sound better

4. My timing was poor - I was thinking about walloping the drums and not feeling the tempo

So in summary at this stage of my playing it's safe to say that playing hard detracts from my groove and is going to cost me money. Normal service will now resume.

Ars*ing about : Critical to practice ?

Something which occurred to me the other day but which I just remembered to write about : The important subject of simply messing about !

As a hobbyist musician it's all about fun - even the non-fun stuff (such as drilling those skills that are holding back my playing) I do because I know that putting that time in will mean I can better play something that I will really enjoy. To that end I try and make sure that on the rare occasions that I can sit behind my kit and make a proper noise that at least some part of it is me simply going nuts and seeing what comes out - even if nothing sensible happens it's a hell of a lot of fun, and every time I sit down I know that at some point, however tricky the practice might be, that that moment is coming soon - a reward if you like.

I don't doubt that this might undermine good practice, create bad habits, or take away from my 'real' practice time - this is about me and my drums for the moment, and ars*ing about is fun :-)

Grrr - wonky sticks !

After about 2 hrs playing (most of it practice pad) one of my sets of sticks has gone, for want of a better word, wonky. One of the pair is now about half the weight of the other, and not straight, and has a very noticeably different pitch. Apparently this is just 'one of those things' that sometimes happens with drum sticks. Although at £7+ a pop I'm miffed !

Practice pads : Size matters !

Out - The 6" Billy Hyde pad

As mentioned before I have a Billy Hyde 6" practice pad. It has a mount underneath to put it on a cymbal stand, but not having a spare cymbals stand I've been using it on a desk (actually quite loud when the little one is asleep - clonk clonk clonk) or my knee (nice and quiet)

In - HQ 12" pad

However, when the small pad is on your knee, it's too close and the practice feels cramped. So either a stand or a bigger pad was required. Somehow I ended up doing both - a chap I know was flogging a snare stand for a tenner, so I popped in to one of the local shops and picked up a nice big 12" HQ 'Real Feel' pad. At £29 it's not cheap (and can be had cheaper online but I am not the most patient man in the world) but it is a nicer surface to play on and mounted in the snare stand it's much more of a 'normal' practice experience

Lesson # 4

Another great lesson this week. I had to confess to not having practiced as much during this 2 week period than previously : as I moaned here I hadn't been at home at drum-able hours much. So the 16th note patterns I got last time remained mostly unpracticed. I had been doing some pad practice though - alternating singles doubles and paradiddles and trying to keep them even at low tempos.

So - we pitched in to test me on my un-practiced 16th note patterns - I surprised myself by playing most of them right off the bat from the notation. The instead of playing multiple bars of one pattern I played through all 16 one after the other - again reading - got it first time - <>

Next was some grip tuning as in doing those patterns my poor right hand grip had resurfaced. Martin's 'point your right finger' drill forced me to keep the stick in my other fingers and against my palm, which for now is the aim. I chose to play much of the rest of the lesson like this to drive this home! While doing this initially we worked out some sensible tempos (based on current breakdown tempo) for me to be practicing singles, doubles and paradiddles at (16ths at 80 bpm for all 3 it turned out)

Then came the challenging section of the lesson : "Pick one of your 8th note patterns and one of the 16th notes patterns - make sure they are nice and different" he says. So I did. Right - play the 8th note one on the hihat and the 16th one on the ride and alternate them. Hmm. There followed some swearing and nervous laughing (I must ask him to stop doing that . . . err no ok then that would be me) and it was clear why we were doing this - it's not as simple as it sounds ! I struggled for a while here until I locked the patterns in my head and it started to come together. When I'd got the idea we moved up a notch to 3 bars of one followed by a single stroke roll fill around the snare and toms, then 3 bars of the other with a double stroke roll fill around the toms the other way with the other hand leading. I had to keep at this for a while until I got it remotely consistent - but I kind of got there - one to practice at home :-)

Then his favourite trick : the same thing, but played open-handed. It's like you have to use someone else's brain for this - it takes huge concentration (well it takes me huge concentration) and breaks down easily - again something to work on at home this time.

Along with those 2 excercises I have bpm targets for my 8th and 16th note patterns "...to be played smoothly and evenly at all times!" and my 3 rudiment excercises.

It seemed like a crammed hour and I left with that best of feelings : like I'd cracked something new and improved since last time. Long may it continue.

My Valentine pressies !

It seems Mrs DrummingDad has been picking up on the hints just fine :-)

This morning the postman delivered the Joey Castillo Percussion Pack - a jam block and mounted tambourine that I had expressed an interest in.

On top of that, the cowbell I won on eBay (Latin Percussion 'Rock' model) arrived too. Percussion-tastic.

Lesson # 3

Update to follow when I find my lessons notes !

Lesson # 2

Update to follow when I find my lessons notes !

Buying my first drum set

So, I had the necessary permission, I'd cleared out the spare room (not totally, my guitars are still in there but unnecessary stuff like bed, furniture and so on was ditched) and I'd arranged to sell off some surplus guitar gear to pay for it : time to buy my kit !

All the advice I'd had said the same thing : get something higher spec and second-hand and wait until after Christmas when it all hits eBay. So I waited. While I was waiting I was offerd what turned out to be an outstanding deal on a snare drum : the much revered 70s Ludwig 400 (see more pics of it here )

I bought a snare stand on my way home from work one day to mount it on, and I was in business with the first parts of my kit : practice was about to get a whole lot noisier.

I'll spare you the anguish of the continual poring over eBay for the next few weeks but suffice to say it was all I could do not to buy the first (and second, and third . . .) thing I saw, until eventually it all came together.

First up were the drums themselves : Mapex Pro M shell pack (shell pack = drums without stands, cymbals etc) for sale in Stoke (via eBay) with a 'buy-it-now' price of £399 : a bargain I was assured by a knowledgable friend. Then on the Drum Classifieds website there was an old DW5000 single-chain-driven pedal, Tama Iron Cobra hi-hat stand and Sabian AA Rock Hats all for sale from the same guy in Hemel Hemsted. On the same site, there was a TRX Ride cymbal (in Worcester) A few emails later and I'd arranged to travel in a huge circle and buy them all one sunny Sunday.

The guy who sold me the drums threw in a stand to hold the 'floor' tom and they chap who I bought the ride from took pity on my money running out (which meant I didn't have a crash on this initial kit) and threw in a splash cymbal (top chap !)

All in all a very nice first setup.

Lesson # 1

I found my drum teacher partly through the Mike Dolbear website teacher register, and James Hester (who I'd met while working at the IGF last year) also spoke very highly of him. We'd settled on bi-weekly 1hour lessons, of which I pre-bought and booked a package of 5.

The teaching setup was ideal - a detached garage at his home had been fully soundproofed and converted to a well-equipped teaching studio complete with 2 full kits and a PA

Update to follow when I find my lessons notes !