In the beginning there is … counting to 4!
Say it out loud: “One – Two – Three – Four -”
Even if you do not own a drum kit yet, the best practise you can start on right away is counting (slowly) to 4 and tapping your right or left hand or foot (or both at the same time) in time with your count. When you reach 4, go back to 1 and keep repeating. This is the essence of timekeeping and the building block that more complex rhythm will be built upon.
The next stage is to get a pair of drum sticks and a practise pad. Keep up the simple counting exercise and start getting used to the way the drum sticks feel. Check out the article on how to hold the drum sticks as a reference guide to finding the optimum grip point of the stick and the options for the types of grip.
How to read drum notation
The principles of drum music are very simple. Each dot in the spaces between the lines represents a different drum.
It’s a good idea to start to familiarise yourself with the basic notation:
Cymbals are represented by an x head rather than a round dot. This is how you tell the difference between a cymbal and a drum.
Drum notation is logical. A more detailed look at drum notation is discussed in The Secret of Reading Drum Music article.
Development of the drum kit
The drum kit is less than 100 years old. Drums and percussion have been around for thousands of years before that, but the concept of putting drums and cymbals together only really started to develop towards the end of the 19th Century. Originally drummers would play everything with their sticks and then they began to mount drums in more convenient ways and started to use their feet. Some drummers would literally kick the bass drum (hence why it’s also known as the kick drum) before the invention of the bass drum pedal in 1909. It was economic pressure and the lack of space in concert halls and theatres that eventually forced drummers to play more percussion parts (previously multiple percussionists were required – e.g. one for the bass drum part, one for the snare drum, one for cymbals etc).
The drum kit really started to become recognised as an instrument in its own right during the 1920s. Jazz musicians displayed never-seen technical and physical skills on their drums and soon rocketed to fame and celebrity status. As music developed through the middle of the 20th Century and especially from the 1960s onwards, the drum kit became more and more prominent in popular music.
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