EDS Lesson Ten Performing a song
EDS Lesson Ten Performing a song
Let us go through the chart together, step by step, looking at each bit and understanding what this chart is asking us to do.
The first thing you will see is the name of the tune,‘The First Time’, and the name of the composer. The title is the important one as, if you had a number of songs to play, it is essential that you play the correct one!
At the top left hand side, before the tune starts, you will see the note, ‘4 Clicks’. This means that you will hear four clicks before the tune starts. This will help count you into the song.
Next is the time signature ‘C’, which is the sign for common time and means there are four beats in each bar. This is familiar territory for you.
Now, you may have noticed that just before the time signature is the beginning of a repeat, as there is the sign we looked at in Lesson 6. This is a good time to look for the end of the repeat and make a note.
The end repeat is actually at the end of bar 6 (bar 12), so you therefore play Verse 1 twice.
Now, what do we actually play? Well, the first thing you play is a standard eighth note rock groove, with a crash cymbal on the first beat of the Verse. That should be straight forward, but just play a couple of bars to get you in the feel of it.
So you have the first Verse played twice and you then move into the chorus, with a cymbal crash to denote the new section. The groove is the same in the chorus as it is in the Verse. Now at bar 16 there is a simple fill to play. This is straight out of Lesson 4, so familiar territory, but a little tricky now it is in the middle of a song. Listen to the music though and you will hear that it follows the rhythm played by the band.
The same thing happens again at bar 20 to lead you into Verse 2, at bar 21.
OK, so there are three things at the beginning of bar 21 to note:
So the end of the repeat needs to be noted so we know when we have to return to bar 21. Like Verse 1, the repeat means that you play the Verse twice and the sign confirming this is at the end of bar 26. You will also begin to hear the Verse as a musical section, after a couple of run-throughs.
Chorus 2. Pretty much the same as Chorus 1, save for the fact the simple fills have been replaced by tougher phrases. Now, they will need to be rehearsed, so I would find the bars on the DrumXtractor and practise them round and round, so that you can play them. Phrasing is covered in Lessons 7 and 8.
Once you have got this far it is pretty much plain sailing through to the end. Verse 3 is just six bars long and the seventh bar (bar 47) has just one thing in it - a crash cymbal on beat 1. As usual you hit the bass drum underneath, but this is a new note for you. All you need to know for now is that it is a whole note and is worth four beats. Simply crash the cymbal on beat 1 and let it ring for a bar. That is the end.
At the bottom of the chart you will see the word ‘Fine’. This means ‘Finished’… ‘the end’.
Now, I would suggest that you watch and listen to the multimedia files, and follow the drum chart through a couple of times.
Once you have done that, have a go yourself. You can play with the drums, or mute the drummer on the track so that you can play on your own.
Remember to:
Next: The First Time
