Escape (The Pina Colada Song) · Rupert Holmes

81 bars, 4:38, at 70 BPM: slow enough that every note is exposed. Crash, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot and nothing else.

PopRockUnder 90 BPMIntermediate
TEMPO
70 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
81
LENGTH
4:38
DIFFICULTY
75/100
THE BEAT

One bar, and 6% of the song

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 14, 34 and 40, and 2 more places -- 6.2% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

LOOP · 70 BPM
ESCAPE (THE PINA COLADA SONG) · BAR 40
THE BEAT, WRITTEN OUT →
THE FILLS

Where it comes off the beat

9 fills to learn, played 56 times: bars 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 9 and 50 more.

LOOP · 70 BPM
BARS 1-5 · LANDS ON BAR 6 · PLAYED 5 TIMES
LOOP · 70 BPM
BARS 9-13 · LANDS ON BAR 14 · PLAYED 5 TIMES
LOOP · 70 BPM
BARS 15-20 · LANDS ON BAR 21 · PLAYED 6 TIMES
LOOP · 70 BPM
BAR 33 · LANDS ON BAR 34

5 more fills are written out on the fills page.

EVERY FILL, WRITTEN OUT →
THE SHAPE

How the song is built

81 bars across 7 sections: 17 keep time and 56 are fills. The longest unbroken stretch of time is bars 21-26.

PART F
PART G
CHORUS
PART T
CHORUS 2
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
4 groovesKTGFFill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest

Questions

What BPM is Escape (The Pina Colada Song)?

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

Is Escape (The Pina Colada Song) hard to play on drums?

75 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 59 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

81 bars, about 4:38 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 26 exercises over 11 sittings, about 25 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 Escape (The Pina Colada Song)?

9 fills to learn, played 56 times: bars 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 9 and 50 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 81 BARS ANALYSED
AT THIS LEVEL

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