Hello and welcome to Learn to Play the Drums.

This is a program of bite sized audio drum kit lessons. These lessons are designed to evaluate and elevate you’re playing skills. No matter how long you have played for, we all have room for improvement. We all have elements of our playing that we embrace and that we avoid. I have been playing for decades now and I am no different. I find myself sitting in my drumming comfort zone. Occasionally things come out of nowhere to trip me up. I am confused that things are tripping me up. I have many years of playing behind me so what is happening? Why do some things trip me up and others do not? The answer is simple really. I have learnt what I wanted too and ignored the rest. The problem now, is that I have left holes in my playing. I am sure that you are the same. Ask me to play a rock beat and I can, without thinking about it. Ask me to play the count using my left foot on the HI hat as well and I cannot. get someone else. I would probably fall off my stool attempting it. Why? I just haven’t practiced it. So why haven’t I practiced it? Because I have never had a structured practicing program. A program that forced me to practice in a structured way. I have always just learnt “this groove” or “that fill” as my whims dictated. Never did I think that I was leaving holes in my playing because I was always improving. Well, I was and I wasn’t. I was getting better at the things I was practicing. I wasn’t getting better at the things I wasn’t practicing. Jazz playing was never cool to me but double kick playing I loved. The trouble is that I left holes in my playing and they caught up with me. They always will. I want to be in a strong place with my playing. If somebody asked me to put the HI hat into that rock beat, then I could. If I am asked to play the beat in 7/8 time then I could. I never want to be in a position where I would have to say “sorry, I can’t do that”. That’s not the player I want to be. I want to be a well-rounded player. So, I needed to make sure I was covering all areas of my playing. I am a system’s trained person so I built a system to work through. I decided to create a collection of programs and exercises to aid my practice. Before I built this I would go to my kit with the intention of practicing. I would sit at my stool and ask myself what am I practicing today. No answer would come so I just played for a while. All the same stuff I had played the day before, absolutely nothing new. I really needed a program to work through. I wanted to have equal control of all my limbs. So, I have made sure that I have treated all limbs equally within my programs. I Have made sure all limbs are played in all possible places within the bar. No limb should be stronger than another. I worked with counting. I focused on the importance of being able to count my way through the lessons. I trained my listening skills. I learnt to listen to how these exercises sounded. How the drums sounded in different places, patterns and combinations. Learning to listen so I could hear what other drummers are playing. I also wanted to start creating and stop just recreating. I no longer wanted to just copy the grooves and fills of my favourite Drummers. I want to take their influences but put me into my creations. To do this though I need full command over all my limbs. No holes in my playing to stop my creativity. This is the Point of the structured practice I have created. It will show you your strengths and boost your confidence. It will show you your weaknesses and where you need to put the practice in. I built the programs for me but soon realised how useful they are. I wanted to share them so here they are. So, work the program and don’t cut corners. You will soon know where you are great and where you are not so great but keep practicing and you will start to improve, I promise. I did!

Good luck!