Monday Drum Day: Brushing up on jazz

I am around 3 years into my drumming journey. Luckily I have some friends who are willing to play with me. We have a band Hive account@theriverkicks who play a mix of old folk tunes and some more modern songs, but some of us are trying something else now with some jazz tunes. We have played jazz before, but then I was playing guitar and drums is a different matter. For a starter I had not played with brushes before. These are used when you want a less percussive sound. I looked up some lessons on Drumeo to get me started. I have done a little swing drumming, but am still getting the feel of it. Drumeo actually have a jazz course starting very soon, so I shall be doing that.

This band had their first session at the weekend. We were back at London Road Studios that we have used a few times. They supply a drum kit minus a few bits I had to bring along, so I could travel light. Also in the band are Hive account@daniellemurray on clarinet and saxophone, Hive account@purplesinger on piano and vocals plus Bob on flute and vocals. We were missing bassist Paul this time.

We worked through a few tunes that all had a swing feel and I am really winging it on the drums. In some of the tunes I was trading solos with the others, but I need to work a lot more on that aspect. I have just included some clips of me on brushes and sticks as we need to figure out what we are doing and these tunes are nowhere near ready for full performance. I have to say that the others are doing really well with their solos. I have seen them develop over the years we have played together. With that experience we can usually pick up tunes fairly quickly.

I was going to use 3speak for the video, but their site is playing up. I may submit it to Drumeo to get some feedback from the instructors on what I should work on. I still have not had any in-person drum lessons and I need that feedback on my progress. Of course I welcome any tips from the drummers of Hive.

Play it cool man!