Simple Man · Lynyrd Skynyrd

104 bars, 6:53, at 60 BPM: slow enough that every note is exposed. Crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick and nothing else.

RockJazz / BluesUnder 90 BPMBeginner
TEMPO
60 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
104
LENGTH
6:53
DIFFICULTY
56/100
THE BEAT

One bar, and 28% of the song

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 40-42, 44-46 and 48, and 9 more places -- 27.5% of every bar the kit plays. That is the spine of it; everything else is what happens around it.

LOOP · 60 BPM
SIMPLE MAN · BAR 40
THE BEAT, WRITTEN OUT →
THE FILLS

Where it comes off the beat

7 fills to learn, played 16 times: bars 7, 17, 29, 43, 47, 49 and 10 more.

LOOP · 60 BPM
BAR 7 · LANDS ON BAR 8
LOOP · 60 BPM
BAR 17 · LANDS ON BAR 18
LOOP · 60 BPM
BAR 29 · LANDS ON BAR 30
LOOP · 60 BPM
BAR 43 · LANDS ON BAR 44 · PLAYED 4 TIMES

3 more fills are written out on the fills page.

EVERY FILL, WRITTEN OUT →
THE SHAPE

How the song is built

104 bars across 4 sections: 83 keep time, 16 are fills and 2 are silent. The longest unbroken stretch of time is bars 18-28.

OUTRO
OUTRO 2
4 groovesJEBS1Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest

Questions

What BPM is Simple Man?

60 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 Simple Man hard to play on drums?

56 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 47 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

104 bars, about 6:53 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 19 exercises over 6 sittings, about 25 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, 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 Simple Man?

7 fills to learn, played 16 times: bars 7, 17, 29, 43, 47, 49 and 10 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 104 BARS ANALYSED
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