One of the most popular styles of drumming is rock. This includes all genres of rock music like heavy rock, classic rock, rock alternative, metal rock, and soft rock. Most drummers decide to start out with rock music because some of the basic rock drumming beats is fairly basic; however do not let these beats set the standard! Rock drumming can be very complex and complicated. There are many different levels to rock drumming that most drummers do not see. So before you pass up the style of rock as being an easy style to play, read this article through first! Let me show you some examples of different styles of rock drumming grooves and beats! When you have fully mastered these ideas, you may want to check out linear drumming for some new concepts of drum beats used in everyday music! A very popular of rock music is Punk Rock, click the link to learn how to play Punk Rock on the drums!
The basic 8th note beat is generally played in simple rock and pop songs. This beat is played in common time, or 4/4, and is one of the first beats most beginner drummers tackle. A lot of drum beats (rock included) are based around this basic beat, so make sure know it and master it well! When a drummer learns this beat they feel a little more comfortable with rock and roll drumming. In addition to this, mainstream music these days is heavily based around heavy rock and pop. Here is the basic beat in which I am talking about:
Let us take a few steps further and break into some odd time signature beats. These are most commonly played in progressive rock music; however it is always good to have a handle on odd time. There are many different time signatures that offer challenging grooves and beats, however let’s look at one in particular; 7/4. In rock, you want to make sure the beat is always driving the song forward. Make sure you are offering a solid pulse that the band can follow. This is a lot easier with 4/4 time, so make sure you are counting aloud when you begin this concept. 7/4 has 7 counts in it before it repeats. Try this common 7/4 rock drumming beat below:
Another challenging concept to start incorporating into your rock drumming beats is the double bass drum. Double bass drumming and rock drumming usually go hand in hand; especially when you are playing heavy metal rock, or rock solos. Spice up your basic rock drumming groove by adding double bass to it. Once you have a handle on the double bass drum you can easily start adding it into fills, solos, breaks, and beats. Try adding a basic 16th note single stroke roll over top of this basic beat learned above:
So as you can see, there is a lot you can do to spice up you rock drumming. These are just three ideas that will change the way you look at the rock style of music. Another great method you can do to totally chane the feel of these beats, is to play them in half time. for lessons on this, check out playing drums in half time! For more interesting ideas and concepts that will challenge you, check out The Drumming System. This is a product completely designed to expand your knowledge and horizons on drumming. Learn all different sorts of beats, grooves, odd time signatures, fills, solo ideas and more on this massive video training set. You can also visit the Rock Drumming Underground for tons of free content on all different styles of rock drumming. Also, try adding groove into these beats by checking out this article devoted to groove!
For additional information on the double bass drum, visit www.bassdrumsystem.com
For additional information on free drum lessons, visit www.freedrumlessons.com