5 STEPS TO GREATNESS
So, you want to get good? Really good? Great even? It’s a new decade and what better way to start than with a firm commitment to being the best you can be and five vital steps from one of the country’s leading drum tutors, Adam Bushell. So, next question: where to start? It may at first seem blindingly obvious that to get good at drumming, extra hours practising is the way to do it. However, there’s so much more to being a great musician than the pursuit of technical proficiency and for we drummers, the butt of musician-based jokes, there is an even greater need to look beyond hours spent in the practice room...
1 LISTEN TO THE MUSIC
As the Doobie Brothers famously once said, “(Woah) listen to the music”! And frankly, there is no better advice, if making music is your thing. The drum kit is a supporting instrument and the very reason for its existence is to support and enhance the music. Drumming for drumming’s sake is fine and for many, a very enjoyable thing to do, but to be considered as really great on the instrument, especially to the ears of non-drummers (those in the band, the audience, etc.) you’ll need to develop a clear understanding of what the drums should be doing in the context of the ensemble. Legendary Jazz pianist Chick Corea said of the great Steve Gadd that “Every drummer wants to play like Gadd because Gadd plays perfect”. Make no mistake, this comment wasn’t relating to how crisp Mr Gadd’s paradiddles are or his single stroke speed or, put another way, the virtues of his technical proficiency. This was an acknowledgement of the fact that Steve Gadd knows just what to play and executes it so well, that it equates to musical perfection. In other words, Gadd’s drumming makes the drums do what they were designed to do, perfectly.
Playing the ‘right’ thing
That’s all well and good and Steve Gadd is, well, Steve Gadd. But how do we know what to play? The UK drumming great Neal Wilkinson (see p.35) was once asked this very question at a clinic. His response? By getting it
