Even if you are not aware that you've heard this drum groove, you almost certainly have heard it. It is one of the most sampled pieces of music of all time and it features on hundreds of recordings.

Let's explore this much-sampled drum groove!

Origin of The Amen Break

The Amen Break is a 4-bar loop which lasts for about 6-seconds, taken from a track called "Amen Brother" recorded in 1969. The track was recorded by The Winstons and featured drummer G C Coleman. It may have remained a relatively obscure funk track had it not been for the rediscovery of the song in the 1980s during the hunt for grooves to loop using the new emerging sampler technology.

From Hip Hop, through to Jungle and Drum n Bass, the Amen Break is arguably one of the most influential drum beats used in electronic music.

Listen to the original drum break in context:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/80/The_Amen_Break%2C_in_context.ogg

How to play the Amen Break

Here is the notation for the Amen Break. The best advice is to tackle it in bitesize chunks, starting with all the elements you are most familiar with. Play slowly whilst you're developing the coordination and independence required to execute this groove. The temptation is to speed it up too soon, before you are really ready to play it up to tempo. Hold it down as a steady, funky groove.

Notation

Drum tab

If you prefer to read this in drum tab, here's how it goes:

C |----------------|----------------|----------------|----------X-----|
R |x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-|x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-|x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-|x-x-x-x-x---x-x-|
S |----o--o-o--o--o|----o--o-o--o--o|----o--o-o----o-|-o--o--o-o----o-|
B |o-o-------oo----|o-o-------oo----|o-o-------o-----|--oo------o-----|
  |1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + |1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + |1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + |1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + |

Amen!

As with all the grooves and exercises you learn, come up with your own variations by experimenting. You might even stumble upon the next great drum loop in the process!