drummers who can't read music notation

MattRitter said:
There's one caveat that I would add about starting reading very early on in lessons:

We just need to be careful that the reading doesn't end up setting the pace for all of the drumming progress. In other words, we don't want to create a scenario where the student is limited to only playing things that they're already able to read.

My own first teacher unintentionally almost did that. Reading was just about the only thing that we did in our lessons. If I hadn't taken the initiative to learn things outside of the lessons as well, I literally wouldn't have learned a basic rock beat until it eventually came up in some book...if it ever did!

Imagine if we handled language like that. We would have 6 year olds talking like, "The...cat...has...a...hat. See...Jane...run. Jane...has...fun."
🤣😆
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I think the logic behind that approach is acknowledge not only can take on exploring things (like that basic rock beat) on their own, but absolutely should.

Nobody can (or should even try to) teach every aspect of playing the drum set - most specifically the player's building of vocabulary. Because there is no fixed, established vocabulary - as each player must find their own bits and pieces - and must internalize them into a system that resonates with them.

This is entirely different learning to be a classical player - on clarinet, violin, or even percussion. There is a specific standard literature and the techniques required to play that literature. That's the path - and really isn't that personalized. Where drum set is an instrument that grew from folk music, specifically jazz.... meaning IMO the main purpose of our drum set teachers is set us up with those technical basics that both classical percussion and drum set playing share. And sure there can be some get things started on the stylistic, basic time patterns, fills, figures, etc, front - but I think lots of it beyond that falls on the player.

Personally I'm not a proponent of doing too much drum set work early on in lessons - work that is too often beyond the beginners ability to play with actual understanding and ownership - counting and coordination-wise. (But I get that many don't agree with me on this).
 
Caz said:
I do have a bit of an opinion on reading that if I could go back, I would not have started reading right at the beginning. The reason is for working on sounding good with rhythm, feel etc I think it's better to approach like a language - lots of listening, repeating, speaking/singing rhythms back. I'd have just concentrated on the audible side of things instead of visual, try to get quite a strong rhythmic foundation, then learned to read later once that rhythmic vocabulary is there. Something I hear quite a lot is horn players who can sight read the notes amazingly well, but can't play even triplets, or consecutive off-beats.. in my opinion, feeling these strongly should be prioritised as step 1, then when learning to read you draw from that.
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Nice, Caz.

We’ve been talking for many pages about whether or not reading is important…but we haven’t talked much about when and how it should be introduced. I enjoyed hearing your perspective on this.

Thanks for contributing.
 
JimmyM said:
And I guess you know now that the vast majority of solid state amps are fine without a speaker load :)
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Yes thanks I think it should be ok for the job. I couldn’t find a straightforward answer on the output level, it’s a balanced xlr line out, which seems to be ’hotter’ than a DI output (which is what they have asked for), so I think Markbass for preamp then DI box should hopefully do it. I’ll be using effects pedals too.

toddbishop said:
That's basically what is done in Suzuki... which famously produces a lot of bad readers.
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That’s interesting, I haven’t heard that before.

dcrigger said:
Nobody can (or should even try to) teach every aspect of playing the drum set - most specifically the player's building of vocabulary. Because there is no fixed, established vocabulary - as each player must find their own bits and pieces - and must internalize them into a system that resonates with them.
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That’s a really good point.

MattRitter said:
We’ve been talking for many pages about whether or not reading is important…but we haven’t talked much about when and how it should be introduced. I enjoyed hearing your perspective on this.
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Thanks Matt, good to hear your thoughts on this too.
 
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I don't read drum music but have come up with my own shorthand for remembering how to play songs on stage. A quick reminder before the first note is struck is very helpful, even for songs I've done a thousand times. Here's how my shorthand looks:

"Guitar, Voc, H4/R4"

Translation: "Guitar player starts the song. You're doing backup vocals, so don't forget to turn on and position your mic. Start out playing quarter notes on hi hats. Later; transition to quarter notes on the ride cymbal."
 
dcrigger said:
I think the logic behind that approach is acknowledge not only can take on exploring things (like that basic rock beat) on their own, but absolutely should.

Nobody can (or should even try to) teach every aspect of playing the drum set - most specifically the player's building of vocabulary. Because there is no fixed, established vocabulary - as each player must find their own bits and pieces - and must internalize them into a system that resonates with them.

This is entirely different learning to be a classical player - on clarinet, violin, or even percussion. There is a specific standard literature and the techniques required to play that literature. That's the path - and really isn't that personalized. Where drum set is an instrument that grew from folk music, specifically jazz.... meaning IMO the main purpose of our drum set teachers is set us up with those technical basics that both classical percussion and drum set playing share. And sure there can be some get things started on the stylistic, basic time patterns, fills, figures, etc, front - but I think lots of it beyond that falls on the player.

Personally I'm not a proponent of doing too much drum set work early on in lessons - work that is too often beyond the beginners ability to play with actual understanding and ownership - counting and coordination-wise. (But I get that many don't agree with me on this).
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Thanks, David.

Yeah, what you described is one of the classic, traditional approaches to lessons. If I’m not mistaken, Henry Adler or somebody like that used to say, “I DON’T teach STYLE.”

To be honest, that isn’t my own approach to teaching at all, but I can still appreciate it.
 
When the question is "reading" vs. "not reading" it gets very binary-- how things are done in actual teaching is another question, hopefully people aren't doing it in a one dimensional way. Students are all different in how they understand/misunderstand things, but partly it's the teacher's job to figure out how to communicate it to them regardless of that.
 
toddbishop said:
Students are all different in how they understand/misunderstand things, but partly it's the teacher's job to figure out how to communicate it to them regardless of that.
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Spot on.

I occasionally mention that having 4 quarter notes in a whole note is like having 4 quarters in a whole dollar. It's not like I try to build an entire system around this money analogy, but it can sometimes be helpful to make a brief reference to something that the person is already familiar with. Imagine my surprise when I discover that the person doesn't actually feel confident with simple money calculations like that!

Or imagine my surprise when the student only knows their right from their left if they hold up their hands with their thumbs out to see which hand makes a letter L!

It's all fine and well to have rigid ideas about how to teach...until we actually have to do it with real live students, all of whom are flawed in certain ways (just like us)!
 
Yeah, I totally get it.

By the way, I should have mentioned that the scenarios I was describing are scenarios that have come up with adults. I imagine that stuff like that is even more common with children. I personally don't generally accept children as students. I think working with children is something that a person really needs to have a special aptitude for.
 
MattRitter said:
Yeah, I totally get it.

By the way, I should have mentioned that the scenarios I was describing are scenarios that have come up with adults. I imagine that stuff like that is even more common with children. I personally don't generally accept children as students. I think working with children is something that a person really needs to have a special aptitude for.
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My teacher was always getting approached by parents to teach their kids but he used to say, if they’re still playing at 12 years old and serious about learning drums come back to me then… :unsure: :)
 
I teach anybody, down to about 8 years old, which seems to be about the youngest you can be doing real stuff-- below 8 you kind of have to be making a game / story book time out of it, and I am not good at that. I just talk to them like they're people, it works out fine. I have a couple of great students who started when they were ~8, are now ~12, and are each killing it in their way. I'm glad I didn't turn them away.
 
dcrigger said:
Personally I'm not a proponent of doing too much drum set work early on in lessons - work that is too often beyond the beginners ability to play with actual understanding and ownership - counting and coordination-wise. (But I get that many don't agree with me on this).
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I don't ever start on drum set, and I let the students and parents know that up front. They have to do about 3 months worth of hand development, reading, and listening to stuff before we go into drum set. If I get student who has been playing before they come to me, we still do 3 months worth of basics...and those are the ones who usually need that the most

toddbishop said:
I teach anybody, down to about 8 years old, which seems to be about the youngest you can be doing real stuff-- below 8 you kind of have to be making a game / story book time out of it, and I am not good at that. I just talk to them like they're people, it works out fine. I have a couple of great students who started when they were ~8, are now ~12, and are each killing it in their way. I'm glad I didn't turn them away.
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yeah, basically 10 or under, the attention span is not long enough to get into coordination practice. I know from my own expoerience (I started drumming at 5) that from 5-10 years old, it has to be in very small doses, with not a lot of fine detail. Dad woulsd just give me 1 or 2 things to work on, and that was it. By the time I was 8ish, I was getting into playing along to albums, and the like, but I also loved to drum, so I was practicing all of the time. WAY more focused than other kids at that age. And the fact that I was getting better is what motivated me to practice.
 
I admit. I can't read
Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX
and 'm thinking of offering to pay Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX
to chop that handle by at least 75%
Come on Ohio 😁
 
Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX said:
yeah, basically 10 or under, the attention span is not long enough to get into coordination practice. I know from my own expoerience (I started drumming at 5) that from 5-10 years old, it has to be in very small doses, with not a lot of fine detail. Dad woulsd just give me 1 or 2 things to work on, and that was it. By the time I was 8ish, I was getting into playing along to albums, and the like, but I also loved to drum, so I was practicing all of the time. WAY more focused than other kids at that age. And the fact that I was getting better is what motivated me to practice.
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They're pretty squirrely, and mostly don't practice at all, but it's all right, just the supervised time working through simple things and learning to count, and to read, is productive. Real interest in music seems to kick in around 12-13 yo-- and they get more playing opportunities-- and having the background is real helpful.

Like I said, these two kids are kicking a**-- one of them I figured was too hyper to do anything with, but he's turning into a real drummer. You never know.
 
toddbishop said:
They're pretty squirrely, and mostly don't practice at all, but it's all right, just the supervised time working through simple things and learning to count, and to read, is productive. Real interest in music seems to kick in around 12-13 yo-- and they get more playing opportunities-- and having the background is real helpful.
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yep...they get a little more focused for us in 5th grade (11-12?)b/c that is when band starts...getting to put all of that knowledge to use. Then in 6th grade, we add jazz band to the regular band as well....

toddbishop said:
Like I said, these two kids are kicking a**-- one of them I figured was too hyper to do anything with, but he's turning into a real drummer. You never know.
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true...every once in a while you get a prodigy still in their shell. I tell parents of 10 and younger kids to have them do piano first. That way, they are getting that "instant success" of familiar music, with the reading as well. I, of course, have certain teachers picked out who I know will get them going the right way....
 
eric_B said:
For people wanting to learn drum notation, this might be useful: https://lp.drumeo.com/100-songs
Listen, play along and learn how to read.
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Personally not a big fan of just jumping in the deep in and hoping I learn how to swim. IMO if someone is wanting to learn how to read, this would serve them far better -

1714458997166.png
It ain't sexy, but one can actually learn how to read starting with this - actually learn how to read well.
 
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