Early Access - Is Talent on Drums a Lie?

3 years ago, El Estepario Siberiano fired a shot across the bow of “conventional wisdom” in drums, with his video and tweet saying “talent is a lie”.

And if we’re talking about the caricature of talent - that certain people just emerge from the womb with abilities more-or-less fully intact, or maybe like an internet mattress that just needs to unfurl, and others are doomed to “grind” for all eternity - I agree.

I get braindead youtube comments all the time that basically amount to “why bother practicing anything; it’s all talent at the end of the day.”

I’ve spoken about my own journey on this front - in 2008 I was contemplating quitting the drums, then picked up a pop science book that explained The Ten-Thousand-Hour Rule, and had the outlines of a change-in-religion: I hadn’t put in anywhere near 10k hours, and therefore had a lot more work before I complained.

And Siberiano, by showcasing his own development from the stage where a lot of my viewers currently are, to the player he’s evolved into, does a good job at debunking the weak form of the talent argument.

But what about the stronger forms?

Deeper dives into the 10k-hour rule have found a number of misunderstandings, and some subsequent studies seem to “debunk” it. What are we to make of those?

And what if there is a “talent cliff”, but it just happens after Siberiano’s former level, if most of us are just doomed to stay where he was 10 years ago. (That would be a pretty wild coincidence, but work with me here.)

For anyone interested in a truly-nerdy deep-dive, this video is for you.

And I bet if you watch the whole thing, you’ll come away more optimistic than you were.

Enjoy!

Early Access - This Should NOT Work To Improve Your Time, But Somehow It Does

Download the free transcription here.

Everyone has heard me sing the praises of the metronome.

But there’s another “cheat” I use to play in time. And it’s analogous to something MMA fighters and boxers do.

But let’s back up. It’s rare that I share “here’s a lick I’ve been working on” lessons these days, because…who cares about me? I’d far rather share an interview with somebody great, or a video about them.

But occasionally people will ask me a question so frequently I decide it should be its own lesson. Such was the case with this week’s topic: time playing.

Sure - practice with the metronome, and use all the crazy tricks we’ve discussed over the years…

…but I’d lying if I said there weren’t certain “copes” that help me stay in time during a performance. And one of the biggest is simply subdividing with my body.

And it just so happens I took notice of a simple “lick” I play quite frequently. It’s analogous to how boxers put a hand out to gauge distance. With this series of 3 “taps” on the snare, I’m both orienting my hand in space so I have a better idea where the drum is when I “wind up” for a rimshot…

…and also orienting my ear in time, so I can “lock up” with the pulse more easily. Particularly when I’m coming out of another subdivision.

It’s a “cope” and a “cheat”, for sure. But I think it’s funky.

See what you think!

Early Access - YouTube Video AND Podcast - Ed Soph and Independence

Download the free transcription here.

Today we have a two-fer I’m very excited about.

One of the forefathers of jazz drum instruction - though as you’ll hear he doesn’t like the taxonomy, preferring to say he’s an “improvisation teacher” - and an 80/20 hot take on a ubiquitous concept in drumming that I think is almost-worthless as an umbrella term.

Change my mind!

Let’s start with independence. I think as a global concept it doesn’t get us any closer to the things is purports to solve than just practicing those things individually.

For instance: a swing beat, being able to improvise with the kick drum during a groove, something like clave in the left foot, and soloing against weird ostinatos, the way Dan Weiss and Marcus Gilmore do.

I wager that you’d be better off practicing all those things individually than creating an overarching category and calling it “independence”. In the video I drill into why we have so-called “meta categories”, when they’re useful, and when they’re not. And I make some conjectures about the history of “independence”, and why the word might be a marketing vestige.

Which might seem at odds with one of the most venerated drum teachers of all time. Until you drill in and realize Ed Soph is himself an iconoclast. His energy is pure punk-rock, and he has no time for the idea of “handedness” on the drums, nor the “walling off” of jazz from other forms of improvisation.

(I chose the thumbnail photo because, agree or disagree with the views, I feel it captures his defiant attitude.)

Ed and I chat about hierarchies in music, how Denton, TX became a music powerhouse away from either of the coasts, teaching psychology, the value of honesty in music, and more.

Couldn’t be more excited about a couple of bits of content, and hope you enjoy!

Early Access - YouTube Video of The Week - Play Ghost Notes Like Porcaro, Purdie, and Garibaldi

Download the free transcription here.

In the video I just taped yesterday, I unpack the idea of “meta concepts” - themes we can pull out of collections of seemingly unrelated things, that help us shortcut our understanding of the world.

One of my favorite examples is grammar. By knowing what the subjunctive tense is, you can practice it as a thing in its own right, and that hopefully saves you time learning a language.

And ghost notes are, in my opinion, a useful meta-concept.

You could take the canon of funk drummers like Jeff Porcaro, Brenard Purdie, Clyde Stubblefield, Mike Clark, David Garibaldi, Harvey Mason, etc. and approach each individual song as if it was its own completely-isolated world…

…or you could recognize some patterns that occur across the works of these great drummers. And if I had to choose one pattern that typifies all of them, it would be ghost notes. (See what I did there? ;)

Besides time and touch, there may be no more useful meta-concept to shed when it comes to getting inside the beats of the great funk and shuffle drummers. By practicing the timing and touch of ghost notes, it’s my contention that you’ll save yourself time becoming a funk master.

And pulling the ghost-note thread feels more faithful to the way our favorite players themselves probably learned things. Music doesn’t exist in a vacuum, after all - all the great players were checking each other out, and borrowing concepts.

In this lesson, I’ll focus on 3 great funk drummers: Jeff Porcaro, Bernard Purdie, and David Garibaldi, and we’ll look at how ghost notes enhanced everything they do.

Then I’ll have some exercises for you.

Know you’ll enjoy this one!