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Mind Games · John Lennon

EXERCISE 16 OF 34
Groove L -- Chorus
46 / 69 BARS COVERED
0 / 34 PASSED · 6 BARS LIT · IN THE CHORUS, CHORUS 2
PART B
PART D
CHORUS
PART O
CHORUS 2
OUTRO
VERSE
5 groovesLODBSFill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 13
FILL · 3
LAND · 3
RUN · 1
JOIN · 5
LINK · 5
SECTION · 3
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Mind Games on drums

69 bars, 4:11, at 66 BPM: slow enough that every note is exposed. Crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot and nothing else.

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

TEMPO
66 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
69
LENGTH
4:11
DIFFICULTY
62/100

ride through bar 1, hi-hat through bars 2-4 and ride through bars 5-69.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 33, 35 and 37-39, and 4 more places -- 18.8% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    33
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
RD |xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx|
SD |----x-------x---|
BD |x------xx------x|
HF |----x-------x---|
Mind Games -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

3 fills to learn, played 3 times: bars 4, 12 and 60.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 30 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 -- O, D -- 2 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- I -- 4 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  3. Through Part B -- 3 exercises, about 20 minutes.
  4. Bars 1-30 -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  5. Through Part D and the Chorus -- 2 exercises, about 19 minutes.
  6. Through Part D and the Chorus -- 3 exercises, about 24 minutes. Open above.
  7. Through the Chorus -- 2 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  8. Through the Chorus and Part O -- 3 exercises, about 26 minutes.
  9. and 3 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Mind Games?

66 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 Mind Games hard to play on drums?

62 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 54 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

69 bars, about 4:11 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 30 exercises over 11 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 Mind Games?

3 fills to learn, played 3 times: bars 4, 12 and 60.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 69 BARS ANALYSED