Chris did a great job incorporating 8th note triplets into his reading vocabulary, and seems to have increased his understanding of how subdivisions relate to one another after working on these reading exercises and playing through the "ladder," of subdivisions a few times. He also did great when reviewing his repertoire, saying that he's been practicing almost every day and has been playing with his dad on occasion as well. Keep on Knocking came very naturally to Chris and provided a great opportunity to discuss the value of staying relaxed, particularly when playing fast. Good Times Bad Times was a song that Chris was already familiar with, but presented us with the chance to talk more about the "slide technique," for those fast bass drum patterns in the verse. Chris demonstrated great patience when working on the slide technique, and while it'll take some time to get that section up to tempo, he's shown excellent progress.

Cam did a great job reviewing the 8th note triplet exercises, playing the entire first exercise with virtually no mistakes on his first attempt. We then moved on to 16th note exercises which Cam also read very well. Through discussing the various subdivisions we've been working on Cam asked some great questions that led us to discussing some music theory and a bit of the science behind sound/acoustics. We talked about how all the sounds we hear are vibrations and how a specific tone or note is simply a specific rate or ratio of vibration. We saw proof of this by watching a brief youtube video in which a programmed series of clicks played at specific intervals is gradually sped up until you no longer hear individual clicks, but several tones (notes) playing in harmony.

Chris is doing a great job reading! After quickly reviewing the core concepts and warming up with the quarter note exercises he was able to jump into the eighth note exercises and decipher the rhythms with very little help from me. He was determined to play through the whole exercise and after a few takes he was able to complete it with virtually no mistakes. Tom Sawyer continues to challenge Chris' endurance which led to a great conversation about technique and effective practice. He then had a great time working on Consoler of the Lonely, a song that includes a lot of interesting and unique drum parts, and was able to learn the basic framework of the song by the end of the song.

Cam is doing really well with his reading! After a brief warm up he was able to play the reading challenges at a fairly quick tempo and with minimal mistakes, most of which he immediately recognized on his own and was able to correct. The new songs, Ain't it Fun and Welcome to the Jungle, present their own challenges and a few brand new techniques to work on. Despite the challenge, Cam did well staying patient and trying his best to work through the difficult sections.

Cam was absent today

Cameron was focused and loved playing along with the songs.

Cam did an excellent job reviewing his song list. He has clearly been practicing at home and seems to really enjoy the variety of songs he can now play. His bass drum technique needed a bit of brushing up, but he did really well readjusting. We finished the lesson by looking at some fun concepts used to play drum fills and looked at some of the really exciting things you're able to do once you've developed those concepts and techniques.

Chris struggled at first with reading quarter notes, but with some encouragement and a bit of demonstration he was able to make good progress. He asked several good questions and quickly became invested in completing the exercise with as few mistakes as possible. After a few attempts he played through the whole 16 bar exercise with only one minor mistake which he quickly corrected in the moment. He played all of his current songs very well, having incorporated a few new techniques, and made great progress on a very challenging song (Tom Sawyer).

Cam was absent

Chris was absent today