Modern Drummer founder Ron Spagnardi wrote an excellent book called Understanding the Language of Music, a Drummer’s Guide to Theory and Harmony. This book spells out the basics of theory and harmony in a very easy to understand way. It is a fantastic book for drummers looking to learn about the language of music beyond drumming. We are honored to reprint the parts of Ron’s book here in Modern Drummer for everyone to read and learn. This month we will be talking about more common Chord Progressions. Chord Progressions are the chords (harmony) that support the melody of a song, and the chords (changes) that soloists improvise on when they play a solo. All (or most) music consists of Sound, Melody, Emotion, Rhythm, and Harmony. Lastly, this month we present three standard tunes so that you can test your understanding of everything you’ve learned in this series of columns, and […]

April 2025 Issue