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Blackwater Park · Opeth

EXERCISE 30 OF 85
Fill at bar 117
118 / 242 BARS COVERED
0 / 85 PASSED · 1 BAR LIT · IN THE CHORUS
PART C
PART F
PART E
CHORUS
PART C
PART Y
15 groovesS5CYADE+10Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 15
FILL · 16
LAND · 16
RUN · 4
JOIN · 15
LINK · 6
SECTION · 12
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Blackwater Park on drums

242 bars of 4/4 at a walking 90 BPM, 10:30 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

89 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is how much of it falls off the beat.

TEMPO
90 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
242
LENGTH
10:30
DIFFICULTY
89/100

hi-hat through bars 3-27, ride through bars 28-41, snare through bars 42-43, hi-hat through bars 44-60, silence through bars 61-113 and hi-hat through bars 114-130, and 7 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 3-13, 15-26 and 118-120, and 2 more places -- 17.1% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

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

The fills

16 fills to learn, played 19 times: bars 14, 33, 39, 43, 47, 51 and 13 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 68 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 -- C -- 2 exercises, about 17 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- Y -- 1 exercise, about 19 minutes.
  3. The grooves the song is built on -- AD -- 3 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  4. Bars 14-44 -- 5 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  5. Through Part C and Part F -- 5 exercises, about 32 minutes.
  6. Through Part F and Part E -- 5 exercises, about 32 minutes.
  7. Through Part E and the Chorus -- 8 exercises, about 32 minutes.
  8. Through the Chorus and Part C -- 4 exercises, about 17 minutes. Open above.
  9. and 15 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Blackwater Park?

90 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 Blackwater Park hard to play on drums?

89 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is how much of it falls off the beat. The beat itself is 38 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

242 bars, about 10:30 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 68 exercises over 23 sittings, about 25 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 Blackwater Park?

16 fills to learn, played 19 times: bars 14, 33, 39, 43, 47, 51 and 13 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 242 BARS ANALYSED