ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Keep On Swinging on drums

97 bars of 4/4 at a walking 88 BPM, 3:40 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

74 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO: 88 BPM
TIME: 4/4
BARS: 97
LENGTH: 3:40
DIFFICULTY: 74/100

snare through bars 1-2, hi-hat through bars 3-64, toms through bars 65-70, hi-hat through bars 71-92, snare through bars 93-95 and ride through bars 96-97.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 8, 20-22 and 24-26, and 1 more place -- 10.6% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    20                               21
    1.......2.......3.......4....... 1.......2.......3.......4.......
CC |x-------------------------------|--------------------------------|
HH |----x---x---x---x---x---x---x---|x---x---x---x---x---x---x---o---|
SD |--------x-----x---x-----x-----x-|--x-----x-----x---x-----x-------|
BD |x-----x---------x---x-x---------|x---x-x---------x---x-x-----x---|

Keep On Swinging -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

14 fills to learn, played 25 times: bars 1, 2, 3, 18, 19, 23 and 19 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 48 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 -- F -- 3 exercises, about 26 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- D -- 5 exercises, about 31 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- K -- 1 exercise, about 14 minutes. Open above.
Through the Chorus -- 2 exercises, about 23 minutes.
Through the Chorus -- 1 exercise, about 15 minutes.
Through the Chorus and Part K -- 2 exercises, about 21 minutes.
Through Part K and Part F -- 3 exercises, about 26 minutes.
Bars 17-35 -- 6 exercises, about 26 minutes.
and 9 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Keep On Swinging?

88 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 Keep On Swinging hard to play on drums?

74 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 69 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

97 bars, about 3:40 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 48 exercises over 17 sittings, about 24 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, 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 Keep On Swinging?

14 fills to learn, played 25 times: bars 1, 2, 3, 18, 19, 23 and 19 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 97 BARS ANALYSED