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Calling Elvis · Dire Straits

EXERCISE 5 OF 30
Fill at bar 28 (a small one)
104 / 126 BARS COVERED
0 / 30 PASSED · 1 BAR LIT · IN THE CHORUS
CHORUS
VERSE
CHORUS 2
VERSE 2
CHORUS 3
VERSE 3
4 groovesBEIS1Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 3
FILL · 8
LAND · 8
RUN · 2
JOIN · 3
LINK · 2
SECTION · 3
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Calling Elvis on drums

126 bars of 4/4 at 117 BPM, about 4:18 of playing, on crash, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

83 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO
117 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
126
LENGTH
4:18
DIFFICULTY
83/100

silence through bars 1-3, hi-hat through bars 4-68, kick and crashes through bars 69-70, hi-hat through bars 71-121 and kick and crashes through bars 122-126.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 5-27, 29-31 and 33-36, and 7 more places -- 51.2% of every bar the kit plays. Learn that one and most of the song is already under your hands.

    6
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
HH |xxxxxxxxxxxxxx-x|
BD |x---x---x---x---|
HF |--------------x-|
Calling Elvis -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

8 fills to learn, played 11 times: bars 28, 60, 64, 68, 70, 82 and 5 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 21 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 -- B -- 2 exercises, about 22 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- E -- 2 exercises, about 25 minutes.
  3. Bars 28-48 -- 3 exercises, about 14 minutes. Open above.
  4. Through the Chorus 2 -- 3 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  5. Bars 64-83 -- 8 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  6. Bars 71-99 -- 6 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  7. Bars 83-126 -- 5 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  8. The whole song -- 1 exercise, about 10 minutes.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Calling Elvis?

117 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 Calling Elvis hard to play on drums?

83 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 65 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

126 bars, about 4:18 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 21 exercises over 8 sittings, about 23 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, 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 Calling Elvis?

8 fills to learn, played 11 times: bars 28, 60, 64, 68, 70, 82 and 5 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 126 BARS ANALYSED