Cam did a great job with the practice pad warm up, and while he at first struggled with the paradiddle pattern with some practice he was able to play the whole thing. He had trouble looping/repeating the pattern, but we'll continue to work on that moving forward. Bring Me to Life is a song that Cam had previously expressed interest in but was, at the time, beyond his ability. Revisiting it now he has a much more diverse skill set that allowed him to find his place within the track much more easily. He's not quite able to match the recording note for note, but this provided us with an opportunity to analyze the beat together and come up with a part that emphasizes the key elements of the recording while still being manageable for Cam. He seemed to really enjoy the process and was excited to finally be playing this song.

Cam has been doing a great job on the practice pad! His technique and speed are both improving significantly and he seems to be enjoying the pad work a lot more than previously. He still struggles playing the fills of No One Knows at tempo, but he's making good progress and was able to get through the first half of the chorus at tempo today with only a few minor mistakes.

Cam left early today

Cam struggled a bit with the double stroke roll technique and was at first resistant to trying, but after some coaching and a demonstration of some of the cool things this technique allows you to play he was more engaged and made some good progress. No One Knows is the most advanced song Cam has looked at so far, mainly due to the prominent drum fills in the chorus section. We spent most of our time breaking down the first two fills. Cam did a great job using his ears to decipher the different voices (drums) featured in each fill and was even able to identify the subdivisions being used. He struggled at first to play the fills, and we still have more work to do to clean them up a bit, but he made excellent progress over the course of the lesson.

Cam did an excellent job adapting his playing to suit the different genres and styles we looked at today. For the most part he very much enjoyed the process, but he resisted trying anything that was more difficult than what he was used to. He seems afraid of potentially over extending himself and making a mistake. We had a conversation toward the end of class about the value of trying new and difficult things, but he insisted that the reason he didn't want to try those certain songs was because he wasn't a fan of the band or just didn't enjoy the song itself. We'll continue to work on this moving forward and see if we can't boost his confidence and get him a bit more comfortable with the idea of making mistakes and/or struggling to play something.

Cam did very well on the practice pad today. Breaking triplets into two note groupings can be difficult, but Cam did very well adjusting to the challenge and was able to do it at a variety of tempos. He was at first resistant to learning My Hero and wanted to work on Everlong instead (another Foo Fighters tune) so we took a brief look at that song before finishing class by learning the chorus of My Hero.

David did a great job! He seemed to really enjoy the drums and by the end of class he was playing along to several different tracks. He seemed particularly excited once he realized how versatile the basic rock beat is and really enjoyed playing along to a few of his favorite songs.

Cam did really well remembering the exercises and all of the songs he's been working on. He only struggled with the song form on For Whom the Bell Tolls, which is easily one of the more complex arrangements we've worked on, as well as being a fairly long song. We reviewed the couple of sections that he had trouble remembering and he was able to pick them back up right away. We also talked about some new fills within For Whom the Bell Tolls, and watched a brief video at the end of class showcasing several variations of a basic drum beat.

Cam seemed to very much enjoy the pizza making process, but did occasionally struggle to stay focused and follow directions. Cam was only interested in making a plain cheese pizza and did very well balancing the ratio of sauce and cheese. The pizza turned out delicious and Cam seemed to enjoy learning about the process.