Not like the movie

How many times have you had to explain this one to your friends?

2013 Holiday Gift Ideas for Drummers

It’s that time of year again! The holiday gift giving season is upon us so it’s time to head to the store to purchase something unique for your special drummer. Many of these items I personally use myself each and every day and others are items I have on MY holiday wish list.

Tools to Create Your Own DRUMLINE Sheet Music

How to Write for PERCUSSION: An extremely detailed and helpful book, not just for beginners but intermediate and advanced musicians as well. Whether you have years of percussion writing experience or no idea how to even approach it, this book will give you hundreds of great new ideas and will show you exactly how to realize them in your music.

Finale Print Music 2011: Simply the best professional music software for arrangers, composers, teachers, students, and drummers too.

My Practice Essentials

BOSS DB-90 Metronome: Dr. Beat! The most advanced metronome available. Trigger input to access unique Rhythm Coach Exercises. I never practice without it.

 

Evans 2-Sided Real Feel 12 inch Practice Pad: The most popular practice pad and for good reason. It serves its primary purpose well - QUIET practice with REALISTIC feel. Definitely a must-buy for drummers who have whiny neighbors.

Percussion Hobbies

Beat Generals: Beat Generals helps you unleash your inner super producer by teaching you all the techniques and tricks the pros use to create the hottest beats on the radio today. I love playing with this in my spare time – try it today!

 

How to Build a Marimba: Really fun comprehensive guides to build your own xylophones, marimbas, vibraphones and other quality percussion instruments.

Other Tech, Gadgets, and Toys

 

Google ChromeCast HDMI Streaming Media Player. Stream my Dumline YouTube videos right to your TV using your smartphone, tablet, or laptop! Perfect for parties, creating playlists, or sharing pictures with grandma and grandpa.

R/C Helicopter. This Brand New 3 Channel mini rc helicopter is the world's newest, most durable and stable helicopter. The item comes with the latest gyro system for precision control. The metal frame has proven to withstand dozens of crashes.

HDMI Pocket Projector. Projects up to 1080p HD images up to 60" diagonal. Rechargeable and portable. Connects via HDMI to most smartphones, tablets, computers, video players, cameras and more.

Breaking Bad: Complete Series. All seasons plus tons of amazing extras for the greatest show on television. The episode titled "Ozymandias" is my favorite episode of any TV show I've ever seen.

Amazon Prime

I highly recommend joining Amazon Prime. If you order something off of Amazon on average once per month then it pays for itself, or if you're ordering a bunch of gifts this holiday season it probably will too. The FREE two day shipping is awesome and everything I've ordered really has come in two days or less. You can also stream movies, TV shows, and get a Kindle book every month. Great alternative for Netflix or Hulu and well worth the investment in my opinion. Cheers!

What gifts are you getting your fellow percussionist for the holidays? Please let me know by commenting below!

Cadets Sheet Music: 2012 Snare Break

Looking for some Cadets sheet music? Check out the 2012 snare solo below.

And of course the video so you can play along. Man that's fast!

 

Download the Cadets 2012 snare solo.

Carolina Crown Wins 2013 DCI World Championships

Carolina Crown won their first ever DCI World Championship last weekend. For only the third time in DCI’s history, (in 1992 and 2004), a record nine corps broke 90 points at the World Championship Finals. The top ten scores were:

1 Carolina Crown 98.300
2 Blue Devils 98.050
3 The Cadets 96.950
4 Santa Clara Vanguard 96.850
5 Bluecoats 93.350
6 Phantom Regiment 93.250
7 The Cavaliers 90.500
8 Boston Crusaders 90.400
9 Madison Scouts 90.100
10 Blue Knights 87.750
11 Spirit of Atlanta 86.400
12 Blue Stars 85.450                

View a complete recap from DCI.org.

Here are the 2013 World Class Caption Award Winners:

Donald Angelica Best General Effect Award
Carolina Crown

Fred Sanford Best Percussion Performance Award
The Cadets

John Brazale Best Visual Performance Award
Carolina Crown

George Zingali Best Color Guard Award
Blue Devils

Jim Ott Best Brass Performance Award
Carolina Crown

 

Posted below is a video of Carolina Crown's victory run after winning the DCI 2013 World Class Championship.

Download drum corp sheet music.

Snare Drum Sheet Music Warmup: Blue Devils Spree 1999

 

One of my favorite snare drum warmup exercises of all time is the Blue Devils Shopping Spree 1999 version. The Blue Devils used to have a warmup exercise every year called Shopping Spree but there's something about the 1999 line that stikes a chord with me. Download the complete Shopping Spree snare drum sheet music. Embedded below is a video of the actual Blue Devils drumline in the lot going shoppin. Check it out. What Spree is your favorite?

 

Download Blue Devils Shopping Spree 1999 - snare drum.pdf

Get more drum corps sheet music.

Colby Beers Tenor Solo Sheet Music

Colby Beers was the 2007 DCI Champion of the I&E Solo competition, scoring a 95.5. His tenor solo was called Free Mind and the sheet music is now available to download for free. Below is a video of the solo for you to play along with and a link to download the sheet music.

 

Download Colby Beers Tenor Solo Sheet Music - Free Mind.pdf

 

Visit our downloads page for more tenor drums sheet music.

How to Create Beats with Beat Generals

Beat Generals is a site that uses FL Studio to teach you how to create beats with easy to follow HD video tutorials. In case you don't already know, FL Studio is a pretty cheap, easy to find, music creation software suite responsible for hit records by Drake, Jay Z, Rick Ross, Lil Wayne, Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Rick Ross and others. It’s easy to make simple drum loops but takes a lot of skill to pull off a well-polished song.

 

So, naturally, I was excited just to find some awesome video tutorials that could help me to start making the beats I loved faster than ever possible before. So now, all I needed were some good drum sounds to make my beats sound better. Luckily, Beat Generals also provides drums for you to use to really get that professional sound quality in your music. Practically anyone can create full radio-quality songs with little more than their home computer! Here is a video tutorial example:

 

 

It's simply amazing to me that one of the most popular programs out there for making beats has so few resources to teach quality techniques. Sure, many things come with experience but where do you get the basics and the advice you need to help elevate yourself to the next level? Beat Generals isn’t something made by some kid in his parent’s basement. We're talking about industry professionals teaching you what you need to know and showing you exactly what to do. If you’re even remotely serious about making beats and making money within the music industry, or you just want to create cool beats to play for your friends, you should check it out.

Beat Generals offers a free trial, so you really have nothing to lose. Try them out today and start making your own beats now.

Drum Licks on Instagram Video

The new fifteen second video feature on Instagram is a great way for us drummers to share our sweet drum licks with the world. You can view a few of mine on my Instagram page: ntweisen.  If you do check it out, I want to apologize, I don’t have a real snare drum and haven’t played on one in years. I just wanted to record pieces of this solo I wrote before my chops are completely gone. Record a few solos of your own and use the hashtag #snarelick or #drumsolo. I’d love to see what you come up with!

 

Pictured below is the snare drum sheet music to one of my videos, just a short and simple little lick I came up with. Feel free to use it if you want.

 

 

And here I am playing it if you don't have Instagram. I haven't uploaded a video to YouTube in two years and today I've uploaded two!

 

Star Spangled Banner Cymbal Fail Video

As the band from Eisenhower Junior High School in Darien continued playing the “Star-Spangled Banner,” Andrew barely missed a beat. This kid's face and reaction is priceless!
 

2013 WGI World Championships Recap

The 2013 WGI World Championships were held in Dayton, Ohio last weekend. Rhythm X won first place in Independent World competition with a record score of 98.263. Aimachi, the WGI group from Japan and always a fan favorite, placed 6th. In scholastic world class, for the first time ever, Dartmouth High School did NOT place in the top three (they just missed the medals by placing fourth)! Father Ryan always has entertaining shows and finally got a medal for their effort. The list of winners for each class is below (with some links to some YouTube videos):

• Independent World Champion - Rhythm X
• Scholastic World Champion - Chino Hills School
• Independent Open Champion - Capital City Percussion
• Scholastic Open Champion - Upper Darby High School
• Independent A Champion - Brookwood Independent
• Scholastic A Champion - Hilton High School
• Concert World Class - James Logan High School
• Concert Open Class - Clayton High School

You can find all the finals scores here.

Fan Favorite Awards

Fans at the show voted for their favorite drumline via text message. Interesting, none of the fan favorites were the gold medal champions picked by the judges. Here are the winners of the fan favorite award for each class:

• Independent World - Infinity
• Scholastic World - Father Ryan High School
• Independent Open - River City Rhythm
• Scholastic Open - Dorman High School
• Independent A - Spirit of America
• Scholastic A - Mechanicsburg High School
• Concert Class - Tunstall High School

Now that indoor drumline season is over it’s time to begin looking forward to drum corps. See the 2013 DCI schedule here: http://www.dci.org/schedule/

Drumline Humor: Honk War

This is a funny drum video called Honk War. An innocent meeting at a traffic lights quickly escalates into an all out war over who has the better skills playing the car horn.  The battle climaxes when one driver pulls out a pair of drumsticks and starts drumming on the steering wheel. Hilarious! And something I’ve totally done before (drum on the steering wheel that is, not get into a honk war). Watch the funny drum video below:

Dartmouth HS 2012 Snare Sheet Music

Today I've got some snare drum sheet music from Dartmouth High School's indoor drumline. Dartmouth has won the Scholastic World Championship four times, silver medal five times, and bronze medal five times as well. The snare line typically plays with a matched gripped, atypical of most line’s traditional grip. Dartmouth earned a silver medal at the 2012 WGI World Championships with their show "Evolved", scoring a 96.825. They beat out Ayala but lost to Chino Hills. Here's a video clip to:
 

 

Download the 2012 snare segment here. My favorite show of theirs was called 2006's "What It Means To Be Human."



Download more indoor percussion sheet music for FREE from our downloads page.

Pulse Percussion 2012 Snare Solo Sheet Music

We’ve got some new drumline sheet music for you, starting with the Pulse Percussion 2012 snare solo. Pulse Percussion was the surprise 2010 Independent World Champion.Their 2012 show was called "Coming and Going" and placed third at the 2012 WGI World Championships with a score of 94.825.

Get the full snare solo sheet music here. Check out the cool video clip below.



Download more indoor percussion sheet music for FREE from our downloads page.
 

Drum Cat Snare Solo

Check out the female leader of Korean drum percussion team "DRUM CAT" perform this crazy snare drum solo. The group got the "HERALD ANGEL AWARD" in the Edinburgh International Festival in 2008. Funny, but you would think she would be using a Yamaha! Remember kids, it's all in the hips.

Math Formula Time Signature

Check it out...it's a musical time signature written as a mathematical formula that is simultaneously simple and complicated.

If you don't want to work out the math (and if you're American you probably can't anyways) I'll let you know that 4/4 never looked so good!

Thanks Alex!

Drumline humor: book reports

Here's some drumline humor for you that will really make you laugh out loud:

And if you don't get, a book report is a hybrid rudiment. I'll let Casey Brohard of Vic Firth to explain:

If you enjoyed this post, please consider sharing it with your friends on your favorite social media platform!

New Snare Drum Sheet Music Uploaded

I’ve recently come across some excellent transcriptions of snare drum sheet music from a few WGI and DCI shows. First up is a Dartmouth HS snare segment from their 2012 show. Next is Ayala drumline 2012 snare solo. Ayala percussion has really grown and is one of the better high school programs in the country. Finally, we have a piece from the Cadets drumline 2012. I can’t wait for winter drumline to start!

Check out the downloads page for more winter percussion music.

Tummy Talk: An Epic Drum Solo

My brother sent my this funny drum video as three percussionists lay down some epic drum soloing action in Tummy Talk.

I really wish I had seen this back in high school. We could have used this idea in Trash Talk.

Boise State girl tearin' it up on the cowbell!

My New Years Resolution has been to post more frequently to Percussion and Drum Stuff this year, especially more drumline sheet music and funny band videos. And speaking of drum videos, embedded below is one that is recently trending from the college football bowl season.

I guess on the cowbell enthusiasm-meter, you've got Will Ferrell on one end, and this girl on the other