What’s the best way to learn drumming? Well, according to research the best way to learn anything is to teach it.
I got my new timetable just before we broke up for summer and SHOCK! HORROR! I’m going to be teaching two year 7 classes music. As I am the least musical person I know this is going to be quite a challenge. I’m convinced I’m tone deaf, I have no sense of rhythm, I can’t hold a tune, when I sing even cats cover their ears.
Luckily I have a very understanding Head of Music. Before we broke up she asked me what I would like to teach and as I would like to learn drums myself of course this is what I said. I put it on my list of challenges as I think learning a musical instrument will help make me become a more rounded person (at the moment I’m relying on cake to do this) and drums are my instrument of choice because hitting something seems a really good way of dealing with stress at the end of a bad day and this would be a legitimate way of doing this.
The Head of Music spent some time teaching me the basics before we broke up for summer. I got excited, she despaired. We’re going to do some work on beats and rhythm and then, a few weeks in, we’ll get the samba drums out and start proper drumming. I have a lot to learn before then as at the moment I can’t even say the names of the various drums let alone play them.
Just to help me along (and because I’m enthusiastic) I ordered myself some drums over the summer. I’ve got a set of bongos and a bodhran. I’ve got these because they were the cheapest out of all the different types of drums and at the moment I just need to something to practice my rhythm and beats on.
As I don’t know anything about levels or stages of drumming I don’t know what to aim for to be able to say I’ve completed this challenge. At the moment I’ll just say it’s in progress and decide later what my actual goal is.
