ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Ai No Prisoner on drums

84 bars of 4/4 at a walking 81 BPM, 4:06 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

73 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO: 81 BPM
TIME: 4/4
BARS: 84
LENGTH: 4:06
DIFFICULTY: 73/100

toms through bars 2-5, ride through bars 6-9, hi-hat through bars 10-22, ride through bars 23-27, hi-hat through bars 28-42 and ride through bars 43-49, and 4 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 6, 8 and 23-25, and 3 more places -- 16.9% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    23                               24
    1.......2.......3.......4....... 1.......2.......3.......4.......
CC |x-------------------------------|--------------------------------|
RD |----x---x---x---x---x---x---x---|x---x---x---x---x---x-x-x---x---|
SD |--------x---------x-----x-------|--------x---------------x---x-x-|
BD |x-----x-------x-------x---------|x-----x-------x-------x---------|

Ai No Prisoner -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

8 fills to learn, played 16 times: bars 5, 7, 19, 26, 27, 39 and 10 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 32 exercises -- the grooves, the fills, and the joins between sections, which is where players actually come off -- and puts them in the order a teacher would. Each one opens on a reduction you can already play and adds the notes back a rung at a time, with a tempo to reach and a gate to pass before the next.

The grooves the song is built on -- D -- 3 exercises, about 23 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- J -- 3 exercises, about 23 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- L -- 1 exercise, about 16 minutes.
Through Part B and the Chorus -- 3 exercises, about 27 minutes.
Bars 2-10 -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
Through the Chorus and Part J -- 3 exercises, about 28 minutes.
Through Part J and Part L -- 4 exercises, about 30 minutes. Open above.
Through Part L and the Chorus 2 -- 3 exercises, about 14 minutes.
and 6 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Ai No Prisoner?

81 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second notes. The room plays it at any tempo from a quarter of that up to the written one, against the record where the record can follow.

Is Ai No Prisoner hard to play on drums?

73 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 56 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

84 bars, about 4:06 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 32 exercises over 14 sittings, about 23 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick. That is most of a full kit; the part moves around it rather than sitting in one place.

How many fills are in Ai No Prisoner?

8 fills to learn, played 16 times: bars 5, 7, 19, 26, 27, 39 and 10 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 84 BARS ANALYSED