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Better Together · Jack Johnson

Better Together · Jack Johnson
EXERCISE 6 OF 13
Groove C
85 / 93 BARS COVERED
0 / 13 PASSED · 2 BARS LIT · IN THE PART B
PART A
PART B
CHORUS
PART B
CHORUS 2
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
4 groovesDBAS1Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 3
JOIN · 3
LINK · 3
SECTION · 3
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Better Together on drums

93 bars of 4/4 at 112 BPM, about 3:19 of playing, on ride, hi-hat and snare.

12 out of 100: straightforward, and the one thing to watch is how often it moves around the kit.

TEMPO
112 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
93
LENGTH
3:19
DIFFICULTY
12/100

silence through bars 1-4, snare through bars 5-20, ride through bars 21-28, hi-hat through bars 29-52, ride through bars 53-60 and hi-hat through bars 61-68, and 2 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 30-52, 62-68 and 85-92 -- 42.7% of every bar the kit plays. Learn that one and most of the song is already under your hands.

    30
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
HH |x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-|
SD |----x-------x---|
Better Together -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

There are no fills to speak of: the part holds one beat the whole way through.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 12 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 -- D, B -- 5 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  2. Through Part B and the Chorus -- 5 exercises, about 27 minutes. Open above.
  3. The whole song -- 3 exercises, about 20 minutes.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Better Together?

112 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 Better Together hard to play on drums?

12 out of 100: straightforward, and the one thing to watch is how often it moves around the kit. The beat itself is 9 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

93 bars, about 3:19 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 12 exercises over 3 sittings, about 25 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

ride, hi-hat and snare. Three pieces and no more -- this one is playable on almost anything with a kick, a snare and something to keep time on.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 93 BARS ANALYSED