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.
Catching Up With Nada Surt's Ira Elliot
Nada Surf has accomplished that rarest of feats in pop music: surviving the massive out-of-left-field success of an early single—a song titled, indeed, “Popular”—and the all-too-typical insult of then being dropped by the record company that released it. TO READ…
Kit of the Month - The Eliminator
When searching for the inspiration to build this month’s featured kit, Travis Wenzel of Elk Mound, Wisconsin, looked no further than his band’s rehearsal space. “This project started out as a 125th-anniversary Sonor Force 2001 drumset,” Wenzel says. “At the…
The Swampy Double Groove - Grease Up Your Phrases
With double grooves, the left hand plays every 8th note using unaccented strokes in between accented backbeats. I refer to these unaccented notes as “taps.” Combining this snare pattern with a standard 8th-note hi-hat figure results in a locomotive groove…
Groove Construction, Part 9: Split Grooves
This month’s groove workshop introduces split patterns. In these phrases, the right hand alternates between two voices, the hi-hat and ride. The arm should hardly move; the motion should originate from the wrist. This concept is especially effective with patterns…
Rock Perspectives - A New Realm of Groove
It might initially seem strange using the term “groove” in conversations about patterns based in odd subdivisions. But examples of these phrases being used in popular music are abundant. A perfect song to demonstrate this concept is Snoop Dogg’s track…
Concepts - Staying Current
Everybody faces the challenge of staying current. It happens in just about everything in life. The music business in particular always seems to be looking for the next new thing, which can be a problem because it ignores the fact…
Product Close-up - Paiste Giant Beat and 2002 Sound Edge Hi-Hats
This year Paiste introduced a slew of new cymbals, including an entire line of heavily hammered 2002 Big Beats, signature rides for top artists like Carl Palmer and Danny Carey, and some massive hi-hats and rides in the 2002 and…
Up And Coming: The Drummers Of School of Rock: The Musical
In 2003, Jack Black played down-on-his luck guitarist Dewey Finn in the feature film School of Rock. The comedian was surrounded by a talented cast of child actors playing fourth-graders attempting to win a battle of the bands to help…
Product Close-Up – Evans Calftone Drumheads
Evans is celebrating its sixtieth anniversary with a tribute to the calfskin heads drummers used prior to the implementation of Mylar plastics. These new old-school heads, called Calftone, feature a layer of beige, subtly textured synthetic material over a clear…
Product Close-Up - Van Kleef All Titanium and B20 Bronze Snares
Sheffield, England–based VK Drums has quickly risen to the top of the high-end custom-shop heap with its elegant and highly musical range of snare drums. We tested a trio of titanium, stainless-steel, and aluminum models in the March 2016 issue,…
A New Perspective - Displacing Two-Over-Three Polyrhythms
This month we’re going to vary the basic phrasing of polyrhythms. Typically, both sides of a polyrhythm begin together on the first note of the rhythm. We can vary this by displacing one or both sides of the rhythm. We’ll…
Papa Jo Jones Drum Fill - Incorporating a Classic Jazz Lick
In this lesson we’ll explore a versatile and great-sounding fill from jazz legend Papa Jo Jones. The basic pattern is notated in Exercise 1. Pay close attention to the sticking—it’s essential to start and end the fill with your lead…
Fred Pierce's Studio Drum Shop
For forty-five years, Fred Pierce has been serving drummers of the St. Louis area in a cozy space he bought outright back in 1972 after moving from Nashville. In Music City, Pierce was a working musician during the ’60s, serving…
A New Year, A New You? Reviewing and Renewing Your Goals, Part 1
We’ve discussed before how the ability to finish something is much more valuable than the ability to start something. Most people are starters, but the most successful people are the finishers. TO READ THE FULL STORY: SUBSCRIBE TO ACCESS LOG…
