ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play divide and conquer on drums

100 bars of 4/4 at 120 BPM, about 3:16 of playing, on crash, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

60 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO: 120 BPM
TIME: 4/4
BARS: 100
LENGTH: 3:16
DIFFICULTY: 60/100

toms through bars 1-8, snare through bars 9-41, hi-hat through bars 42-43, snare through bars 44-52, silence through bars 53-55 and snare through bars 56-71, and 4 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 28-39 -- 13.5% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    28                                                               29
    1...............2...............3...............4............... 1...............2...............3...............4...............
CC |x-------------------------------x-------------------------------|x-------------------------------x-------------------------------|
SD |--------------------------------x-------------------------------|--------------------------------x-------------------------------|
BD |x-x-x---x-------x-x-x---x---------------x-x-x---x-------x-x-x---|x-------x-x-x---x-----------------------x-x-x---x---------------|

divide and conquer -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

7 fills to learn, played 7 times: bars 22, 43, 51, 59, 63, 67 and 1 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 39 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.

The grooves the song is built on -- R, AB -- 3 exercises, about 30 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- AD -- 6 exercises, about 33 minutes.
Through Part A and the Break -- 3 exercises, about 22 minutes.
Through Part E -- 3 exercises, about 26 minutes.
Through Part S4 and the Chorus -- 5 exercises, about 20 minutes.
Through the Break 2 and Part W -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
Through Part W and Part S8 -- 4 exercises, about 28 minutes.
Bars 42-71 -- 7 exercises, about 29 minutes.
and 4 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is divide and conquer?

120 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 divide and conquer hard to play on drums?

60 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 43 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

100 bars, about 3:16 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 39 exercises over 12 sittings, about 24 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick. That is most of a full kit; the part moves around it rather than sitting in one place.

How many fills are in divide and conquer?

7 fills to learn, played 7 times: bars 22, 43, 51, 59, 63, 67 and 1 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 100 BARS ANALYSED