ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Red Cold River on drums

76 bars of 4/4 at a walking 91 BPM, 3:20 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

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

TEMPO: 91 BPM
TIME: 4/4
BARS: 76
LENGTH: 3:20
DIFFICULTY: 70/100

silence through bars 1-9, snare through bars 10-17, toms through bars 18-19, snare through bars 20-28, hi-hat through bars 29-36 and snare through bars 37-50, and 4 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 19-21, 23-25 and 41-43, and 3 more places -- 26.9% of every bar the kit plays. That is the spine of it; everything else is what happens around it.

    19                               20
    1.......2.......3.......4....... 1.......2.......3.......4.......
CC |x-------x-------x---x-------x---|x-------x-------x---x-----x-----|
SD |--------x-----x---------x-------|--------x---------------x-------|
FT |------------------------x-------|--------------------------------|
BD |x---------------x---x-------x---|----x---------g-x---x-----x-----|

Red Cold River -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

6 fills to learn, played 8 times: bars 14, 18, 26, 48, 59, 63 and 2 more.

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.

The grooves the song is built on -- F, B -- 2 exercises, about 30 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- K -- 2 exercises, about 27 minutes.
Through Part C and the Chorus -- 4 exercises, about 16 minutes.
Through the Chorus -- 2 exercises, about 21 minutes.
Through the Chorus -- 4 exercises, about 27 minutes.
Bars 25-42 -- 5 exercises, about 24 minutes.
Through the Chorus 2 and Part M -- 2 exercises, about 21 minutes.
Through Part M -- 2 exercises, about 20 minutes. Open above.
and 3 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Red Cold River?

91 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 Red Cold River hard to play on drums?

70 out of 100: demanding, mostly on the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 53 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

76 bars, about 3:20 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 30 exercises over 11 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 Red Cold River?

6 fills to learn, played 8 times: bars 14, 18, 26, 48, 59, 63 and 2 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 76 BARS ANALYSED