ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Open Face Surgery on drums

200 bars at 190 BPM -- fast, and 4:04 of it without a break -- on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

98 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is how many notes a second it asks for.

TEMPO: 190 BPM
TIME: 4/4
BARS: 200
LENGTH: 4:04
DIFFICULTY: 98/100

kick and crashes through bars 1-4, hi-hat through bars 5-38, ride through bars 39-46, hi-hat through bars 47-54, ride through bars 55-80 and hi-hat through bars 81-82, and 13 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 39-45, 55-61 and 124-130 -- 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.

    40                                               41
    1...........2...........3...........4........... 1...........2...........3...........4...........
CC |------------------------------------------------|x-----------x-----x-----------------------------|
RD |x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----|------------------------x-----x-----x-----x-----|
SD |---x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x--|------------x--------x-----x-----x-----x-----x--|
BD |x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----|x--x--x--x--------x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----|

Open Face Surgery -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

21 fills to learn, played 48 times: bars 4, 20, 24, 28, 29, 38 and 42 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 65 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 -- N -- 1 exercise, about 22 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- D -- 2 exercises, about 26 minutes. Open above.
The grooves the song is built on -- K -- 3 exercises, about 29 minutes.
Through the Break 2 and Part D -- 8 exercises, about 30 minutes.
Through Part D and Part K -- 3 exercises, about 30 minutes.
Bars 27-47 -- 7 exercises, about 32 minutes.
Bars 43-64 -- 3 exercises, about 28 minutes.
Through Part N and Part Q -- 5 exercises, about 19 minutes.
and 15 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Open Face Surgery?

190 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second notes. At that speed the thirty-second notes are the whole difficulty, so the room will take it down to a quarter of it and climb back.

Is Open Face Surgery hard to play on drums?

98 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is how many notes a second it asks for. The beat itself is 94 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

200 bars, about 4:04 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 65 exercises over 23 sittings, about 25 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 Open Face Surgery?

21 fills to learn, played 48 times: bars 4, 20, 24, 28, 29, 38 and 42 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 200 BARS ANALYSED