Blackbird · Alter Bridge

317 bars of 3/4 -- not four -- at 149 BPM, 6:23 of playing on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

Alternative / IndieRock120 to 149 BPMShuffle / tripletIntermediate
TEMPO
149 BPM
TIME
3/4
BARS
317
LENGTH
6:23
DIFFICULTY
55/100
THE BEAT

One bar, and 21% of the song

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 9-15, 17-19 and 21-23, and 19 more places -- 20.8% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

LOOP · 149 BPM
BLACKBIRD · BARS 9-10
THE BEAT, WRITTEN OUT →
THE FILLS

Where it comes off the beat

12 fills to learn, played 50 times: bars 16, 20, 24, 28, 32, 60 and 44 more.

LOOP · 149 BPM
BAR 16 · LANDS ON BAR 17 · PLAYED 15 TIMES
LOOP · 149 BPM
BAR 32 · LANDS ON BAR 33 · PLAYED 7 TIMES
LOOP · 149 BPM
BAR 60 · LANDS ON BAR 61 · PLAYED 6 TIMES
LOOP · 149 BPM
BARS 98-100 · LANDS ON BAR 101 · PLAYED 6 TIMES

8 more fills are written out on the fills page.

EVERY FILL, WRITTEN OUT →
THE SHAPE

How the song is built

317 bars across 22 sections: 113 keep time, 50 are fills, 127 are stops and 4 are silent. The longest unbroken stretch of time is bars 130-149.

PART B
PART N
CHORUS
PART A
PART H
PART F
CHORUS 3
OUTRO 2
13 groovesGCHNA+8Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest

Questions

What BPM is Blackbird?

149 BPM, in 3/4, 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 Blackbird hard to play on drums?

55 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 14 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

317 bars, about 6:23 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 70 exercises over 17 sittings, about 26 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 Blackbird?

12 fills to learn, played 50 times: bars 16, 20, 24, 28, 32, 60 and 44 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 317 BARS ANALYSED
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