Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Snare Drum Sheet Music Warmup: Blue Devils Spree 1999

blue devils 1999 spree sheet music
 
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.

Monday, July 29, 2013

Colby Beers Tenor Solo 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.


 
 
Visit our downloads page for more tenor drums sheet music.

Saturday, July 27, 2013

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.
 
how to create beats with beat generals

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.

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

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!
 

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

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!
 

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

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):
2013 wgi world championships recap




  • 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/

Monday, April 15, 2013

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: