Practical Beatboxing

Its easy to start

Repeat the following words and then loop them.

Boots n cats n

Building a basic drum kit

Cymbal
Tomtom Bass

Making the sounds

B for bass drum: Bu (as in butter) T for tom-tom: T (a soft t/d as in lighten) C for cymbal: S (as in snake)

Using basic percussion sounds

Try the following sets of letters, using the basic sounds

B C

T C

B C

T C

B C

T C

B C

T C

Remember to keep to the beat!

Building a simple percussive piece

T
B

X
-

X
-

Try this as a whole class and loop it to the beat

Introducing the eight-beat

Traditionally beatboxing rhythms start with forming an eight-beat B 1 T 2 C 3 T 4 B 5 T 6 C 7 T 8

Using B T C, create your own eight-beat in pairs and loop to the beat.

Beatboxing notation

Beatboxing notation can be entered in to an adapted form of guitar tab S H B I----IK---I----IK---I I--T-I--T-I--T-I--T-I IB - - - I - - - - I B - - - I - - - - I
Snare sounds Hi-hat sounds

Bass drums

Getting started with beatboxing

Once you have mastered the three basic sounds and you have notated them, you can make your basic 8 beat. Use the empty grid to create your 8 beat

S H B

I----I----I----I----I I----I----I----I----I I----I----I----I----I

Loop your 8 beat rhythm to the beat.

Beatboxing notation to try

Bass drum sounds

B Heavy bass drum b Soft bass drum U Techno bass drum

Hi-hat sounds
T Ts: a short, sharp sound S Tssssss: an open cymbal sound t a closed hi-hat sound tk sound both letters, spaced evenly and repeating to make a continuous hi-hat rhythm

Snare sounds
K a rim-shot snare sound C add air, as in cup, for a basic snare sound P Pf or psh, a more open snare sound G a techno snare sound

Making your rhythm sound interesting

Using a combination of the different sounds, create three sets of eight-beats and notate them. Bear in mind that you can double sounds, creating quavers and making your eight-beats sound even more interesting BT K P P 1 2 34 BT BT P P 1 2 34 TK TK TK BB and so on 1 2 3 4

Using a microphone

Beatboxers use a microphone to help us hear their beats more clearly. They cup their hands around the top of the microphone in different ways, the idea being that the maximum amount of sounds are collected by the microphone.

To practise your beatboxing without a microphone, you can cup your hands around your mouth to collect the maximum amount of sounds, until you are confident.

Extended technique
The snare roll

Bprrrr similar to blowing into a trumpet; use the lips to create a horse-like noise or a cat purr Kurrrr roll the tongue on the roof of your mouth Krrrrrr as above, but bare your teeth in a grimace