Dom Famularo

Re: DOM FAMULARO

From Dom to you all:

Please send this to all your readers.....
"I am so humbled and inspired by what you all said. The brotherhood of drummers is the best! No other instrument has this. My Father was a Fireman and I learned from how they all treat and respect each other...we as drummers do the same thing! I travel the globe trying my best to give as much as I can, but it is every drummer that motivates me! The great questions, the endless passion, the incredible dedication and the honesty to the art form. This is what I learn from all the drummers I meet! My Italian grand parents once told me...'speak from your mind and not everyone will understand...but, speak from your heart and the world will hear your message!' I always try to give 110% each performance...like it is my last! Life is short and I want my last performance to be my best...whenever that is! When I feel like I am giving 100%, that is the time to give more! Each one of you reading this has a responsibility to your talent! Learn everyday and share it...give it away! You will reach people and inspire them to aspire! You are the next generation of drummers! Thank you all and I hope to meet you during my travels! If you see me...come up to me and say we met at DrummerWorld! Bernhard brings us all together...he is a rainmaker for drummers. Thanks Bernhard and thank you all! See you soon.....somewhere!"
Onward and Upward...
Dom
www.DomFamularo.com
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

Life is short and I want my last performance to be my best...whenever that is!

what great words...a signature for a forum member if ever i saw one.

j

PS: if you are reading this, Dom...thanks. your spirit is the distilled spirit of what this forum is all about. please sign up and drop us a word or two in the DRUMMER section when you can.
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

I have only recently come to learn of Dom and his infectious good cheer. We could all only hope to have an instructor such as Dom. Planning on ordering his book "It's your Move" very soon. Well actually I''ve asked for it for my birthday...my 45th! I am looking forward to being at my all time best as a drummer at 50! There is no reason why we all can't continue to improve no matter what our age.

You youngsters are blessed. Use your time wisely.
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

I love this guy!!
The last time he was in Seattle I didn't know who he was, and passed up a chance to meet him.
Next time I'll know better!
I just dig the pictures of him ... always with that huge, happy smile ... makes me think of my mom saying, "... your face will freeze like that!" ... only in a real good way!!
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

Yeah, I guess you could say Dom is partly to blame for my recent return to the drums. I had first heard of him just a few weeks ago when I watched the "TUDW 2002" dvd. AMAZING style!! And yes, he did play his sticks off his glasses!
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

Knevildrummer said:
I guess it's just like the Weckl or Peart bashers. Some people are just looking for reasons to hate.

Or some people don't quite get other people's infatuation with certain drummers? Hardly hate.

Dom, however, is the epitome of a great guy. If a drummer ever ran for President, I think Dom would be the only choice. He can seriously bring together so many differing people and opinions with his infectious personality.
 
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Re: DOM FAMULARO

I actually think he's a great educater...also for kids.

Because he likes to introduce all the ways of playing...and does not stupiditly say that or that grip is the best, etc.
I also think, that if he's always so motivating - with the big smile - and trying to accent the positive aspects of playing when teaching, he can motivate a lot of students to work hard....

I think these are also very important things in an educative way...
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

Pedro said:
I think it's a pitty he uses so much double bass. He's such a creative drummer...why must he add so much double bass at the end of his playing? !

Well, he is one of the innovators of the double pedal (if not THE innovator). I think he was the first guy to advocate dumping the second bass drum in favor of the newly developed double pedals (not that it is better, as double bass players will tell you two drums are better).

Why NOT incorporate double bass? We don't use just 1 hand when we play, so why not develop the left leg as well? I know I work hard at it, although I would rarely need it in the style of music I play. It has helped in my coordination, and really freed up my left leg for jazz and syncopation on the hihat (played with foot).
 
How could any drummer not love Dom? He's just the best. What a great player, great teacher and great motivator. His Cyber lessons are great to start your day with for just the positive vibe alone.


Waterjet / Love the Drum & Worship at its Temple
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

Stu_Strib said:
Why NOT incorporate double bass? We don't use just 1 hand when we play, so why not develop the left leg as well?

That kind of makes sense, but I've always thought that the whole "Well, we use both hands so why not use both feet" is actually rather different from how it works out. For me playing double bass is more like training yourself to be able to play fast, ultra-powerful singles on an 18" floor tom - it's something you do have to develop with your hands, and whether you choose to do that is really based on whether you see yourself having a need for it.

I mean sure, it can't hurt. But if your ultimate aspiration is to be a jazz drummer your time would be better spent learning to better control your snare drum tones and dynamics than working on ultra-powerful strokes on loose floor toms. See what I mean?

So while I do work on my left foot a lot (on the hi-hat), I don't really see the point in a double pedal. I literally have no use whatsoever for that much bass drum.
 
Re: DOM FAMULARO

Oh, and as for the debate over Dom going on.. I think there's some arguing at cross purposes going on.

I don't go watch Dom Famularo solos and go "Wow, that's what inspired me to be a drummer". I go listen to music, and I enjoy much simpler, less flashy playing in that context. Dom is a very choppy, very entertaining drummer. But I wouldn't hire him over 90% of the rest of the guys on Drummerworld just because he doesn't have as well-paved a playing history.

But if I was going looking for a teacher - and I might be, shortly, seriously enough to get on a plane to the US for a while - then Dom would be very high up the list. He clearly has a great depth of technical knowledge and has studied directly with all the greats. And while grumpy-but-great players are awesome to listen to (Tim Alexander? He always seemed pretty grumpy in interviews, and the rest of Primus seemed to be saying the same) I'd much rather have lessons with somebody who sends me out the door in a great mood wanting to go practice as much as humanly possible.

It's kind of like Kung Fu, I guess. You wouldn't hire an eighty-year-old chinese guy to be the doorman on your nightclub, but you wouldn't go to a six-foot-tall mid-twenties Samoan dude if you wanted to be the next Bruce Lee. Players and teachers can be very different beasts, and I reckon Dom is probably an astonishing teacher.
 
The thing with Dom that I most respect is that he chose this path (clinician, educator) many years ago and has kept true to his vision. How many people do you know (drummers and non-drummers alike) who are doing what they love and getting paid for it? Probably extremely few.

Many drummers in the US haven't heard of him simply because he tends to do international tours. (Also many drummers are woefully uneducated about the history of drumset and drummers.) He has opened many countries to drum clinics, from China to former Warsaw Pact nations. That's why he's the "ambassador". He started as a clinician back in the day when he was the Director of Education for Tama. That's where this direction started. He found that he loved teaching.

Until this last generation of double pedal players came up (Lang, Donati) he was probably the best double pedal player anywhere. His feet are entirely under control (and astonishingly fast and smooth).

Ask any pro drummer from Chapin to Gadd to Donati (3 generations) and they will all sing Dom's praises. Geez, Jim Chapin even wrote a song entitled "Dom". Steve Gadd has gone on record as saying that Dom is the authority on drumset technique. Virgil endorses his book and considers him to be the best drumset teacher going. I could go on and on...

Someone with this much credibility in the industry doesn't need me to stick up for him but
I had to chime in on his behalf. I consider Dom a friend as well as a teacher and the fact is that he has directly changed my drumming (and my life) for the better.
 
Knevildrummer said:
Someone with this much credibility in the industry doesn't need me to stick up for him....

Maybe not but I'm very glad you did. You see, this is the great thing about this site: I can come on here and post something about a guy I know very little of, just my gut feelings from what I've seen. Some people will get annoyed, others, like you, will calmly explain why I should look again. This benefits not only me, but any others who may have felt the same way as me (like, "Who the hell is Dom Famularo?!") and are silently following this thread. This is why I think critical posts should remain and not be deleted, because there are a lot of smart people here who can disagree calmly and, in the process, educate their fellow drummers. It's funny, but I could have sworn my posts had been deleted the day after I wrote them, and now they're back....people power?
 
Hey Womble, I get your point, but in this case I am very surprised at your take. Saying you don't know who Dom Famularo is would be like a NASCAR wannabee saying he's never heard of Dale Earnhardt! (or you F1 guys, saying you've never heard of Michael Schumaker)

Unless, I guess, clinics and education really haven't been what you are into since you took on drumming?

Come to think of it, I don't think I know a single recording off the top of my head, but I've seen him so many times, and seen so many educational videos and books from him that I feel like we are good friends. And I have an 8x10 black and white signed photo from 1983...hehe.
 
Stu you're giving your age away again. Heh. I took a gander over at his official website a long while back and he doesn't actually cite any recordings he's appeared in. I'm sure he's been in a few but somebody not having heard of Dom is understandable. Not having a high profile as an artist can have a big effect on your media exposure, especially if you are not from the same country as the drummer in question.

Back onto Dom. Great guy, great player (like his chops or not) and he's what everyone would want and need in a teacher. His enthusiasm, though sometime grating, is something we should all note down. To be that motivated and clearly inspired by the World around him is a much better perspective than the embittered 'I could have made it' perspective a lot of us have or are going to have in the near future.

Go Dom!
 
Sure, I'd be happy to. I remember being impressed with the way Dom approached his drum kit as a musical instrument, as opposed to merely a 'rhythm' instrument. He got a great overall sound out of it and had a keen sense of using nuance and dynamics in his playing. To this day I don't know if I've played with a drummer who could match his cymbal technique. Dom and I played together from 81-82, and for me it was quite a learning experience (especially being only 22 years old when I joined his band).

I remember that we had a certain musical trust onstage, and for that reason Dom wasn't afraid to push me in unexpected directions. What you hear on those tapes is a band that had a completely different repertoire every show, with no more than 1 or 2 rehearsals for each, so there's a bit of that "fly by the seat of your pants" element. It certainly made for some incredibly musical moments, and also taught me to trust my own instincts on stage, which in turn made me a better player.

My only criticism of Dom at that stage of his development, and this could probably apply to anyone in that band, was that he occasionally had a tendency to show off his technique a bit much. Unfortunately it was sometimes at the expense of the groove. Perhaps it was the 'adrenaline' of the moment, or the fact that many of Dom's students would come to those shows and he felt the need to put on a show for them, I'm not really sure.

Now having said that, I'm intrigued by Dom appointing himself "Drumming's Global Ambassador" these days. Do drummers have any thoughts on that?
 
I first heard of Dom from my teacher in MD, Grant Menefee. Grant gave me a copy of a note Dom had written:

"Watch your thoughts, for they can become words,

Watch your words, they can become actions,

Watch your actions, they can become habits,

Watch your your habits, they can become character,

Watch your character, it becomes your destiny!"


(I apologize if I've misquoted that, but I'm going from memory)

I thought that was one of the best pieces of advice one could give another, drum-related or not. I'm a fan of those that have not only excelled at a particular study, but at the human-excellence thing as well.

SRJ
 
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