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Answering the Call · Dream Theater

EXERCISE 21 OF 107
3-bar fill at bar 32
83 / 265 BARS COVERED
0 / 107 PASSED · 3 BARS LIT · IN THE PART O
PART D
PART O
BREAK
CHORUS 2
PART AS
CHORUS 3
PART BS
PART BS
OUTRO
10 groovesLCLS4BSAS+5Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 15
FILL · 30
LAND · 30
RUN · 2
JOIN · 11
LINK · 9
SECTION · 9
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Answering the Call on drums

265 bars of 4/4 at 142 BPM, about 7:25 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

57 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO
142 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
265
LENGTH
7:25
DIFFICULTY
57/100

hi-hat through bars 1-18, snare through bars 19-32, toms through bars 33-34, hi-hat through bars 35-40, silence through bars 41-78 and hi-hat through bars 79-93, and 16 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 19, 21 and 23, and 21 more places -- 11.5% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    19
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
CC |x---x---x---x---|
SD |--------x-------|
BD |x---x---------x-|
Answering the Call -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

30 fills to learn, played 124 times: bars 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 118 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 76 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.

  1. The grooves the song is built on -- L, M -- 2 exercises, about 21 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- BS -- 3 exercises, about 18 minutes.
  3. Through Part D -- 3 exercises, about 33 minutes.
  4. Through Part D and the Chorus -- 5 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  5. Through the Chorus and Part O -- 7 exercises, about 32 minutes.
  6. Through Part O -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes. Open above.
  7. Bars 39-81 -- 5 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  8. Through the Break 2 and the Chorus 2 -- 6 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  9. and 15 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Answering the Call?

142 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in sixteenth 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 Answering the Call hard to play on drums?

57 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 16 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

265 bars, about 7:25 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 76 exercises over 23 sittings, about 27 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

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

How many fills are in Answering the Call?

30 fills to learn, played 124 times: bars 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 118 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 265 BARS ANALYSED