Latest Drum Lessons

Street Samba Drum Lesson

Street Samba Drum Lesson

Street Samba Drum Beat Learn a street samba drum groove This is a street Samba drum beat adapted for the drum kit. The Samba is a rhythm type from Brazil which is lively, infectious and often seen at carnivals making people dance. Usually this rhythm is performed by the bateria which is a large group of percussionists that play on a drum or other percussion instrument each. These can range from drums to shakers, whistles, tambourines and scrapers. The collective sound is very powerful. So here we are going to try and replicate that street samba drum sound using just…
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Jazz Samba Drum Beat Lesson

Jazz Samba Drum Beat Lesson

Jazz Samba Drum Beat Learn this basic Samba drum beat The samba drum beat is closely linked to the bossa nova drum rhythm, both of which are from Brazil. However the samba drum beat is taken from much livelier, carnival dancing music whereas the bossa nova is usually slower. And so authentic samba sees groups of percussionists, ranging from small to hundreds strong,  making up the percussion group (bateria) performing these beats in the street at carnivals. There are different sounds being played from large surdo drums, through shakers, tambourines, caixa, cuica, pandeiro, repinique and whistles. The collective sound is…
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Advanced Samba Drum Beat

Advanced Samba Drum Beat

Advanced Samba Drum Beat Learn this advanced Samba drum beat This advanced samba drum beat is an extension of the basic street samba drum beat. It takes that pattern which was already quite a challenging four limb independence exercise and makes it even harder. But it's worth it because the end result sounds great! You probably already know that samba is a Brazilian rhythm which is usually played by lots of percussionists. From the mid-20th century drummers have been adapting these rhythms for the drum kit which enables one person to do the job of many. To create this thick layered rhythm…
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Samba Independence Exercise For Drums

Samba Independence Exercise For Drums

Samba Independence Drum Exercise Learn a fun Samba independence exercise This Is The Samba Independence Exercise for Drums This samba independence exercise is a really fun way to test your four limb independence whilst also improving your samba grooves.Now I should tell you straight off that this isn't the place to start for total beginners of Samba. This lesson assumes that you already have a basic grasp of a jazz samba beat. But if you don't have that then don't worry.....you're not excluded. You can jump across and take that lesson first. Click here to learn the basic jazz samba and…
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The Funky Drummer | Clyde Stubblefield

The Funky Drummer | Clyde Stubblefield

The Funky Drummer Drum Beat Learn the Funky Drummer- One of the most sampled grooves in history The Funky Drummer is one of the most famous drum breaks (or break beats) in the history of recorded music and as such it is one the most sampled drum beats ever having appeared in countless tracks across a range of genres. Although the practice of sampling old funk grooves really came about through rap and hip hop initially. The beat is performed by Clyde Stubblefield on the James Brown track. Clyde was one of Brown's favourite drummers alongside Jabo Starks and has been responsible for playing…
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Drummer Timing Exercise No. 1

Drummer Timing Exercise No. 1

Drummer Timing Exercise No. 1 Try this drummer timing exercise to develop your internal metronome This Is The Drummer Timing Exercise No. 1 Why is this drummer timing exercise important? Well I think you'll agree that being able to play with a metronome is an essential skill for the modern drummer. And most of us start learning this skill early in our development today which wasn't the case in the past.However, if we're not careful we become too dependent on the click turned up loud hammering in our ear and this mean that we have lost the ability to use…
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Seven Essential Drumming Audition Tips

Seven Essential Drumming Audition Tips

Seven Essential Drumming Audition Tips Audition tips to help you hold your nerve I think you’ll agree with me when I say that auditions are pretty scary scenarios. No matter how much we prepare, we often go into that audition room and give an under par representation of what we can really do. I have my share of audition nightmares like most musicians but over time I developed some key strategies to help me perform at my best in this pressurised situation. In this article I want to share some of the key audition tips with you so you can…
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Steve Gadd Style Shuffle

Steve Gadd Style Shuffle

Steve Gadd Style Shuffle Drum Lesson Learn a Steve Gadd Style Shuffle Drum Beat This Is The Steve Gadd Shuffle Drum Beat Lesson Let's check out a Steve Gadd style shuffle drum beat because....well anything that Steve Gadd gives a magical twist to is worth investigating. If you're new to the world of shuffles then you might like to check out  Blues Shuffle 101 Course which starts from the beginning and delves deep with various shuffle grooves and fills as well as a drumless playalong track. You could also grab this blues shuffle backing track so you have something to use to make…
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Blues shuffle Drum Course 101

Blues shuffle Drum Course 101

Blues shuffle Drum Course 101 Learn how to really plays shuffles with this blues shuffle drum courseThis is the blues shuffle drum course 101. It teaches you how to understand and count the blues shuffle by breaking it down developing the feel for this wide spread groove. Such a huge proportion of music is swung and yet so many drummers who grow up listening to rock and pop can only play in straight time. In fact, I remember performing as support for a blues artist who had recently disposed of a drummer that I had huge respect for having loved his playing with a very famous…
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Seven Eight Drum Course 101

Seven Eight Drum Course 101

Seven Eight Drum Course 101 Learn how to play in seven eight time signature with this seven eight drum course This is the seven eight drum course 101.  It teaches you how to understand and count in seven eight by breaking it down and showing that it's not weird, it's not scary, it just needs understanding. That's what I told my wife about me when we met and it seemed to work out! ;-) Once we have that understanding we will build a vocabulary of essential seven eight grooves as well as a series of fills. Armed with these you…
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