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Drum playing level classification

amarin
Thu, 26 Jul 2018 17:21:36 GMT

I was wondering how is the drumming level determined? Is there an audition process? Are the drummers required to showcase their skills prior to attending a class? Is there a certain person who determines if a drummer should attend advanced, or "pro" classes? This is our first year at the retreat. Thank you for any information.

annamelnikoff
Fri, 17 Aug 2018 23:39:28 GMT

It's pretty much determined on the honour system - i.e. you self-evaluate. No one will be kicking you out of an advanced class if you're not technically advanced, but I will say from personal experience that there is nothing more frustrating, as an advanced professional drummer, than attending an 'advanced' class and discovering that the room is filled to overflowing with beginner and intermediate drummers because that particular instructor happens to be popular. Please, please, don't be those people. If the class is listed as advanced, and you're not sure if you qualify, chances are you're right. Go and watch the class for a bit if you really need to know, but honestly, it's hard enough for actually advanced drummers to get challenging instruction in North America without everyone rushing the advanced classes at Wula, which was, until recently, one of the VERY FEW places in North America I could go to actually get pushed beyond my comfort zone. A few years back this site had some guidelines for self-evaluation that went roughly as follows (also adding my own interpret ation as a drum teacher and performer for the past 20 odd years): Beginner - 0 to 5 years experience, basic technique, ability to follow basic accompaniment parts and simple solos, and remember a couple of basic breaks, maybe a couple of basic dundun parts. Intermediate: 2-10 years experience, tones and slaps are clear, if not entirely consistent, able to remember and accurately play several accompaniment parts, able to identify the time signature of a rhythm, be familiar with several (at least 3!) traditional rhythms (minimally able to recognize them, if not play all of the djembe and dundun parts), be at least familiar with or able to play a few basic solo phrases in several rhythms, familiar with echauffement parts on both dundun and djembe, familiar with a few basic breaks and arrangements, able to hold down a basic offbeat djembe part on your own without fumbling. You should be taking regular classes with traditional teachers for at least a couple of years by this point, and be comfortably able to follow instruction for arrangements and solo phrasing with minimal break down. Advanced: 5-? years experience, able to reproduce clean, fairly consistent tones and slaps, able to remember and play all the parts from at least a half dozen traditional rhythms - accompaniments, solos, echauffements, dundun/bell parts and variations. Able to solo with both traditional and improvised phrasing. Enough endurance to comfortably play for a dance class (i.e. fast and consistent accompaniments for at least a half hour, to the point of serious sweating). MUST be able to hold down offbeat patterns on both djembe and dunduns (non-negotiable!), MUST have at least passing familiarity with different handing systems (even if you don't use them all). Able to follow solo phrase instruction fairly easily on the fly. Possibly beginning to learn how to mark steps for dancers. Very serious about learning the traditional forms by this point - probably have travelled to West Africa at least once, or at least attended local intensives with African teachers. In other words, if all you've ever done is attend a once-weekly class off and on, chances are you're still at the intermediate level. Professional: 10 years+ experience, with AT LEAST a couple years experience teaching and/or performing traditional rhythms at a professional level (i.e. not 'drum circle improv' performances!). Technique should be clear, clean, consistent and musically precise, and you should have the ability to play high-speed phrasing, polyrhythmic phrasing, triplets, rolls, reversing flams, offbeats, etc. You should have in-depth knowledge of several rhythms to the point you could teach them to a group, including all accompaniments, solos, echauffements, dunduns, variations, and arrangements. Possibly even developing your own arrangements. Comfortable with performing, playing standing up, able to remember complex arrangements and able to learn and remember complex solo phrasing -at nearly full speed - with minimal repetition. In fact, you should be able to learn and play complex solo phrasing and arrangements from vocalizations alone. (yes, you will need this in the pro classes). Able to improvise solos to any rhythm. Able to mark steps for dancers. I hope this is helpful for you (and others!) I've attended the Wula retreat several times, and the first year, people were very respectful of the level designations for the drum classes, but in the past couple of years I have found this not to be the case. I had to walk away from a couple of advanced classes in 2017 because there were no seats left, and another literally ended up being taught as a beginner level class because there were several students in the room who didn't even know how to play with the correct handing or timing for pak-ti-pak (a basic 6/8 accompaniment), so the instructor not only had to take time out to teach this basic skill, he had to spend 10 times longer teaching basic accompaniment parts, which we never got past before the end of the class. For any advanced drummers in the room, it was a total waste of their time and money. This in turn ended up pushing a number of relatively advanced but definitely NOT professional drummers into the pro classes, which slowed those classes down as well. This trend is something I personally find to be highly disrespectful - there are plenty of classes with ALL of the instructors at beginner and intermediate level, you don't need to be lowering the bar on the advanced classes. Ambitious beginner/intermediate drummers please take note - a typical advanced class will usually spend no more than 3 minutes on accompaniment parts and THAT'S IT! It's assumed you're already familiar with those parts. So please, please PLEASE!!! Leave the egos at the camp entrance and leave the advanced classes for the truly advanced players, so we can all have a good time.