Here's a quick rundown of all the drums lessons with a brief description of the
things you'll be learning in each lesson.
Lesson 1: Building a Rock Groove
You will play a rock groove to music using three-way co-ordination
by the end of this lesson.
Lesson 2: Introducing Eighth Notes
By introducing musical notes you will be able to read and then play 5 more rock grooves
by the end of lesson two.
Lesson 3: Introducing Sixteenth Notes
After Lesson 3, you will be able to play not only a small variety of rock grooves,
but also simple fills around the drum kit.
Lesson 4: Using Subdivisions For Fills
This lesson builds your library of rock fills and helps you understand how
to read simple but effective fills easily.
Lesson 5: Developing Hi-Hat Lines
Here you will improve your time keeping skills and begin to vary the patterns you
can play on your hi-hat whilst playing grooves.
Lesson 6: Developing Rock Grooves
This lesson continues straight on from Lesson 5 and expands the library of grooves
you can play.
Lesson 7: Phrasing Part 1 Introducing Phrasing for Fills
Playing exciting fills whilst using the whole kit is what drumming seems to be about.
This is the first of a two-part lesson introducing more exciting fills.
Lesson 8: Phrasing Part 2 Developing Phrasing for Fills
This is the second of a two-part lesson in playing more exciting and musical fills
using the whole kit.
Lesson 9: Introducing the Crash Cymbal
A simple introduction to adding the Crash Cymbal into your playing whilst grooving
and filling.
Lesson 10: Performing a Song
Learn how to play with a professional band, whilst reading a drum chart. This lesson
can go towards your Level One in Essential Drum Skills with Gigajam Drum School.
Lesson 11: Introducing Rests Part 1 – Quarter, Eighth and Sixteenth Notes
Introducing rests and how they are used in music to create more varied rhythms
on and around the modern drum kit.
Lesson 12: Developing Rests Part 2 – Sixteenth Notes
Using all of the rests studied so far and incorporating them in a series of play-along
examples that develop notation reading and performance skills.
Lesson 13: Reading – Combining Rhythms Part 1
Here we begin to combine different note values together to create more complex rhythmic
patterns.
Lesson 14: Reading – Further Rhythm Combinations Part 2
We continue our development of combining rhythms providing us with a huge library
of essential rhythms.
Lesson 15: Reading – Rhythmic Combinations as Fills Part 3
Builds on Lessons 13 and 14 and provides two challenging drum studies that incorporate
the new rhythms you have learned.
Lesson 16: Developing Fills and Counting
In lesson 16 we learn to play short fills that have very wide use in modern drumming.
This lesson also continues to build your performance of the new rhythms you have
been learning since Lesson 11.
Lesson 17: Reading – Introducing Dotted Notes Part 1
To be able to play more sophisticated grooves requires understanding of the use of
dotted notes in music. This first lesson of two parts provides you with practical
snare drum studies to build your understanding of dots in readiness for the new
grooves in lessons 18 and 19.
Lesson 18: Reading – Introducing Dotted Notes Part 2 (Sixteenth Note Bass Drum Grooves)
In Lesson 18 we introduce much more sophisticated bass drum patterns in our Rock
grooves. This is essential work for improving and strengthening your three-way co-ordination.
Lesson 19: Developing Rock Grooves 2 (Sixteenth Note Bass Drum Grooves)
Introducing 16 new bass drum grooves challenging and then strengthening your ability
to control the drum kit.
Lesson 20: Performing a Song – ‘The Buzz’
The study of the song ‘The Buzz’ develops reading and performance skills and completion
means you can attain Gigajam Drum Level 2.
Lesson 21: Introducing Ties
Understanding ties – ties, like dots, create huge problems for drummers, as
they primarily deal with the length of a note.
Lesson 22: Developing our use of Tied Notes
Interpretation of tied notes — pushes .
Lesson 23: Introducing ‘Setting-Up Fills’ Developing our use of Tied Notes
Using tied notes to develop ‘set-up fills ’. Following on from the last lesson,
we are now going to expand our ability to read and play tied notes by introducing
the concept of setting-up.
Lesson 24: Introducing Triplets (Part 1)
Understanding triplets — so far we have learned how to subdivide a beat into
quarter notes, eighth notes and sixteenth notes. These subdivisions of the beat
are collectively referred to as simple time. We are now going to look at triplets
at the beginning of our study of what is called compound time .
Lesson 25: Introducing Triplets (Part 2) — Triplets as Grooves
Understanding triplets in grooves (introducing 12/8) — We will start by introducing
the idea of time signatures without getting too involved in all the permutations.
Lesson 26: Introducing Triplets (Part 3) — Rock Shuffle Grooves
Understanding shuffle feel. Shuffle describes a rhythmic feel and is well
understood by experienced musicians. To develop the feel of shuffle from a learners
point of view though requires us to understand the role of triplets in producing
a shuffle feel.
Lesson 27: Phrasing — Developing Triplet Phrasing
Understanding how to phrase triplets. In Level One we introduced the concept of phrasing
using sixteenth notes and single stroke rolls. Now we are going to continue developing
phrasing, but this time with triplet eighth notes .
Lesson 28: Phrasing — Developing Triplet Phrasing as Fills
Applying triplet phrases as fills. Now that we have introduced the counting and playing
of accents with triplets, we now need to apply them to the kit.
Lesson 29: Introducing Whole Notes and Half Notes
Whole Notes and Half Notes are the only notes we have ignored so far. In this lesson
we are going to introduce them to you, so that you know what they look like and
how they are played.
Lesson 30: Performing a Song – ‘Coming Up Shortly’
Applying new skills in a Drum Chart. This song contains new difficulties from the
previous two songs.
