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Big Empty · Stone Temple Pilots

EXERCISE 8 OF 31
Groove G (a two-bar phrase)
44 / 75 BARS COVERED
0 / 31 PASSED · 4 BARS LIT · IN THE PART C
PART C
PART K
CHORUS
PART C
PART K
CHORUS 2
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
3 groovesNKCFill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 7
FILL · 5
LAND · 5
RUN · 2
JOIN · 4
LINK · 4
SECTION · 3
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Big Empty on drums

75 bars, 4:50, at 62 BPM: slow enough that every note is exposed. Crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot and nothing else.

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

TEMPO
62 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
75
LENGTH
4:50
DIFFICULTY
74/100

hi-hat through bars 1-43, snare through bars 44-46, hi-hat through bars 47-48, ride through bars 49-52, toms through bars 53-57 and hi-hat through bars 58-67, and 3 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 13-19, 34-40 and 58-60, and 1 more place -- 26.7% of every bar the kit plays. That is the spine of it; everything else is what happens around it.

    13                                                               14
    1...............2...............3...............4............... 1...............2...............3...............4...............
CC |x---------------------------------------------------------------|----------------------------------------------------------------|
HH |--------o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------|o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------o-------|
SD |----------------x-------------------------------x---------------|----------------x-------------------x-------------------x-------|
BD |x-----------x-----------x-----------x---x-----------------------|x-----------x-----------x-----------------------x---x-----------|
Big Empty -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

5 fills to learn, played 18 times: bars 12, 33, 43, 45, 47, 50 and 12 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 25 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 -- K -- 1 exercise, about 15 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- N -- 3 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  3. The grooves the song is built on -- C -- 1 exercise, about 16 minutes.
  4. Through Part C -- 2 exercises, about 21 minutes.
  5. Through Part C and Part K -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes. Open above.
  6. Through Part C and Part K -- 3 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  7. Bars 17-31 -- 5 exercises, about 24 minutes.
  8. Through the Chorus 2 and the Outro -- 4 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  9. and 2 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Big Empty?

62 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second notes. Slow enough to hear every mistake, which is why the room lets you sit at the written tempo rather than under it.

Is Big Empty hard to play on drums?

74 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 52 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

75 bars, about 4:50 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 25 exercises over 10 sittings, about 22 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 Big Empty?

5 fills to learn, played 18 times: bars 12, 33, 43, 45, 47, 50 and 12 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 75 BARS ANALYSED