Education
Modern Drummer is the world’s most widely read drum magazine, is dedicated entirely to the art of drumming and caters to the needs of amateur, semi-pro, and professional drummers.
Touring Life and Lessons
For this month’s article, I’m going to share some of my experiences from over the years while on tour with various artists. I’ve been fortunate enough to have done many different “levels” of tours, everything from stadiums to smaller 200-300…
Recording from Home and Wearing Three Hats
Last month we talked about the challenges of picking up the drumsticks for the first time, studying, and the process of learning to become a good drummer. This month we take a big jump forward in your drumming journey. My…
Bob Moses Drum Wisdom: The Eight Points
In last month’s Modern Drummer, we reintroduced Bob Moses’ fabulous notion that he calls “The 8/8 Concept” from his book Drum Wisdom. Bob’s concept of feeling music in 8/8 leads naturally into another concept that Bob calls “The Eight Points.”…
Carmine and Taylor
Taylor Hawkins has mentioned in several interviews, that along with playing along to songs off of the radio, some of the first beats that he learned, came from his next-door neighbor showing him the first page of the Carmine Appice…
Radical Hybrid Drumming “Behind the Scenes” with the Essential Rudiments
There is a range of percussion midi functionality essential to all electronic percussion controllers. In this month’s column, I am going to use several of my custom hybrid drum kits (and a new song) to demonstrate the key features that…
Taylor Hawkins In His Own Words…
I wasn’t good at sports and I was having a hard time finding girlfriends. It was 1982. I was ten years old, and just getting into the music of the day, new wave, the Police, and stuff. My older brother…
Concepts for Beginners
This month’s article will focus on some monumental ideas that will help you quicken your growth as a drummer when first starting out. Some of these concepts were taught to me by my drum instructors when I was younger, and…
Bob Moses Drum Wisdom: The 8/8 Concept
This month we will be begin exploring Bob Moses’ classic book called Drum Wisdom. In this book Bob explores the organic side of drumming with wonderful explanations of some of the most important ideas in playing music. We will begin…
“Essential Dialog” for Creative Percussion Controllers
This is where the journey begins… This is the first in a new series of articles exploring the creative use of percussion midi controllers. I was recently watching YouTube videos covering the history of electronic drumming. It’s amazing to see…
Chad Smith’s Red Hot Chili Peppers Audition
I grew up in Detroit and moved out to California in August of 1988. Through a friend of a friend, I got the audition with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. My friend knew a girl who was dating John Frusciante.…
Transcriptions:
“Salute to Kareem,” Mother’s Milk; “Suck my Kiss,” Blood Sugar Sex Magik; “Breaking the Girl,” Blood Sugar Sex Magik;“Readymade,” Stadium Arcadium; “Dark Necessities,” The Getaway; In this month’s cover story and interview Chad Smith talks about R&B and funk drumming,…
Past Masters of Rock... Absorb, Adapt & Adopt!
I have the incredible honor of interviewing some of the greatest musicians in the world on the YouTube channel, “The Sessions Panel.” The purpose is to capture the story of these great artists for future generations to learn and be…
Carl Palmer Applied Rhythms
This month’s Basics contains a series of fills that are based on flams, and is included in Carl Palmers book Applied Rhythms. The idea here is to flam various 8th notes in the bar, and to voice the 8th notes…
Sixteenth Note Triplets
Carmine Appice’s Ultimate Realistic Rock book is an educational standard in teaching “realistic” rock drumming. The title means you are learning drumming vocabulary (beats and fills) that you would realisticly use in a rock song or band. The recently updated…
