Rock & Roll 101

September 17th, 2013

Bella doesn't start this week.

September 10th, 2013

Bella doesn't start this week.

June 26th, 2013

Great job Bella!! This has been a fun year... try working out Uptown Girl by using different inversions in the right hand.

Maybe see you next year!

June 19th, 2013

Today we added Uptown Girl by Billy Joel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEIcTstEmnQ

I wrote out the chords on a piece of paper, and went through it three or four times with her.

June 12th, 2013

We played through It's Still Rock and Roll to Me a few times, and worked on the fills, especially the triplet (four style) quadruplets in the fills... she's very close, needs to practice!!!

June 5th, 2013

Bella wasn't able to come in today... sickness in the family.

May 29th, 2013

Karen decided she didn't want to sing on her recording, so we started a new Billy Joel song "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me" and Bella focused on the drums.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBbo0slWMW4

We learned the triplet style drum fills, and went over the song a few time.

May 22nd, 2013

May 15th, 2013

Bella did a great job on the piano for Two Black Cadillacs, so we have moved to the drum set.

I showed her the basics of how the beat goes, and we worked through the "experimentation" issues-- she says she's afraid of failing, or messing up, and that's why she doesn't like to take a risk and experiment, but I encouraged her by saying that failure is the key to learning-- without making mistakes, we never learn from them.

By the end of the lesson, my instinct was that she felt optimistic about what I was asking of her. I hope too much time doesn't pass before she tries on her own drum set so she can establish the memory of how to do it.

May 8th, 2013

Bella really nailed the chords this week. She had forgotten about the "words" we learned-- the little riffs to make the song more interesting, so we worked on that again and videoed it. She played it through a few times, and really has the knack!

So we learned the intro melody parts as well and she went through it a few times.

Perhaps we can convince her to record it and maybe record the drum parts as well.

May 1st, 2013

Two Black Cadillacs:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVEBZLrjpw4

We added the left hand in, and I showed her some "words" -- vocabulary ideas like a rolling country lick, the Dsus to D, and alternating fifths on the chords.

April 24th, 2013

April 17th, 2013

Good job on this.

The next step is to add complexity to the left hand. We worked through the whole song, building the detail from beginning to end -- starting soft with whole notes on the first verse, then adding quarter notes to the left hand in the second verse, adding arpeggios to the right hand, etc.

April 10th, 2013

Today we reviewed Amazing Grace, My Chains are Gone. We focused on timing a bit, and playing with both hands, which she's getting very close to being done on.

Work on it some more, and think about what song you'd like to work on next.

April 3rd, 2013

March 27th, 2013

March 20th, 2013

We went through sus4 and sus 2 again, and I asked her to work on it for C, G, Dm, Em keep in mind sharps for Em (f#)

Then we did the song Amazing Grace my Chains Are Gone. I'll send that chart-- remind me if you don't get it.

March 13th, 2013

March 6th, 2013

We added some fancy to the right hand:

rocker, arpeggios, sus 2 and 2 chords, sus 4 chords.

Eighths on right hand.

February 27th, 2013

February 20th, 2013

Bella is going to bring her book next week, and think of another song to work on.

Bella, I'd like you to focus on the other way of playing the chords, and play it just as fast as you did the way you played today.

February 14th, 2013

February 6th, 2013

Today we switched to piano as her instrument.

I showed her the same things I showed her sister: We learned triads, major and minor chords, that there are 3 of each in every key, and one diminished.

We played through the scale of chords (triads starting on C up to C).

We learned stronger, and I encouraged her to play it with inversions, without moving her wrist.

Her hands are too small to play octaves with the left.

January 30th, 2013

Bella and I talked about complexity, and adding features to a beat to make it more fun to play, and interesting to listen to.

Try this with Stronger, and even Piano Man when you practice.

January 23rd, 2013

We reviewed the 3/4 and the 4/4, which are 3 quarters and 4 quarters.

We talked about 6/8 time (triplets over boom chuck).

We did fills over the 6/8, slowly.

We reviewed Kelly Clarkson's Stronger.

Learn those fills, add your own. Go crazy.

January 16th, 2013

We played triplets on the high hat while playing a regular boom-chuck beat, and then I played a bit of "Shout to the North" to it. She picked that up very quickly.

Then we talked about 3/4 time, or Waltzes. I showed her how she could play the snare on beat 2, beat 3, or both beat 2 and 3.

We tried playing triplets as fills, but she had a hard time hearing them as compared to two sixteenths and an eighth, so we'll save this for later.

We then played along with Kelly Clarkson's Stronger, and I asked her to learn the fills and have them ready for next week.

January 9th, 2013

January 2nd, 2013

December 19th, 2012

Bella and I reviewed the beat types we've done so far, and she remembered them all!

We went over triplets, and she had a bit of a challenge, but will work on that more. I want you to play tripplets on the highhat on every beat, like we did, to get used to how they feel.

Then play an eighth note beat, and add triplet fills.

Then we added Disco, and played along with Bee Gees. She can do more of this to get used to the beat.

Then we played with http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xn676-fLq7I Kelly Clarkson, Stronger, and talked about fills... add some crashes, and snare dit dit dah! fills

December 12th, 2012

Bella and I reviewed quarter note and eighth note and sixteenth beats.

We learned about triplets, and how they are three notes fitting in the space of 1 or 2.

So on quarter notes, there are three eighthnote triplets in a beat.

Over two quarternotes, there are three triplet quarternotes in two beats.

Play fills using those in combination with the other beats.

December 5th, 2012

November 28th, 2012

We stepped back a bit this week and worked on a simple eighth note groove, and focused on doing the flam on beats 2, 3, and 4, with eighth notes on the other beat.

We then did Kelly Clarkson's Stronger, and worked on the fills for that song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khiz9yrMpDE

November 21st, 2012

We reviewed drum fills and sixteenth beat -- she's going to work on that.

Do flams, 16th, 8th, quarter note fills.

Next week we'll record with video.

Try to think of a song to learn the drum parts to.

Practice with your mom.

November 14th, 2012

Today we reviewed the beats we've worked on in the past.

Bella should continue to work on fills starting them on beats 4, 3, and 2.

Also add the sixteenth beat to the things she practices.

November 7th, 2012

Bella was sick today, so no lesson. :(

Get well soon!

October 24th, 2012

Amazing today, Bella! You sounded great!

1. We went over the quarter note and eighth note grooves, and we reviewed the fills on beat four, with one beat, and two. Then we did the four beat drum fills. The cover a whole bar.

2. Then we talked about flams. That's when you hit the drum bang-bang close together... like it sounds almost like one sound, but there's a bit of double sound.

3. We then talked about how to use different beats in verses and chorsues. So, for example, a quarter note beat in the verse and eigthth in the chorus.

4. We talked about side shots, for slower ballad songs. You can make it sound deeper by moving the stick. We did this with "SHout to the Lord."

5. We did a hip hop style beat, where you hit the snare right after beat 2 and 4, on the eighth note beat. Try to do that a bit but don't worryh about making it perfect.

6. Then we did the double kick, and she has that down.

7. Finally, we did the ride cymbol on the chorus of The Cave by Mumford and Sons.

October 17th, 2012

Today we went over boom chuck both the quarter note and eighth note grooves.

We did crashes on one, each measure and every other measure.

We did two beat and one beat drum fills... on the and of 4 and on 4 itself... with two toms and one tom.

We did the double kick beat (boom boom chuck) with a crash on one and with out.

If she can, she should practice on thin air... use pens as your drumsticks or even two spoons on the table.

October 10th, 2012

We spent the first few minutes of the lesson reviewing the drum names, and the quarter note and eighth note beats. Then we went over the crashes on the beginning of every second measure, and then tried it with a single tom fill right before the crash.

When we did the double (eighth note) rock beat, she had a harder time playing a single quarternote fill.

Finally, we finished with adding an extra eighth-note kick beat right before beat one on the eighth note groove.

NOTE: a groove is a synonym for a beat.

October 3rd, 2012

Today Bella and I worked on two new elements to playing drums:

1. Crashes at the beginning of bars -- first every bar, then every 2 bars, then every 4 bars.

2. Drums fills, just before a crash: boom chuck boom (chuck tom) | crash!

Then we added the open/closed hi-hat. She plays an eighth note beat (doubles on the hi-hat), and opens and closes the high hat when she hits "Boom."

September 26th, 2012

Today Bella and I reviewed the boom-chuck beat, and played with a metronome.

http://www.metronomeonline.com/

We talked about quarter notes, and what they were (four of them in a whole), and if we cut each beat into two, there would be eight notes in a whole, or "eighth notes."

She then played the two different kinds of beats, and switched between them every two measures. I want her to practice this more.

Then we played a song, "Forever, by Chris Tomlin," and she changed it to the eighth beat in the chorus, and the quarternote beat in the verse.

She should do this at home with various songs, using head phones.

September 19th, 2012

Bella and I started with shaker, foot and hand, and then moved to tambourine, shaker and foot... she picked it up quickly, and we moved to the kit.

We worked on the boom chuck beat for a while, and I played with her.

I want her to practice the boom-chuck at home using tambourine for snare, shaker for high hat, and floor for kicking.

We talked about the names of the instruments, tom tom, etc. and we did endings for just a bit.

September 12th, 2012

No show