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What It Takes · Aerosmith

EXERCISE 4 OF 24
Run B1 · Part B (bars 1-5)
57 / 90 BARS COVERED
0 / 24 PASSED · 5 BARS LIT · IN THE PART B
PART B
CHORUS
OUTRO
3 groovesDPBFill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 6
FILL · 4
LAND · 4
RUN · 1
JOIN · 3
LINK · 2
SECTION · 3
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play What It Takes on drums

90 bars, 5:09, at 70 BPM: slow enough that every note is exposed. Crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick and nothing else.

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

TEMPO
70 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
90
LENGTH
5:09
DIFFICULTY
51/100

toms through bar 1, ride through bars 2-5, hi-hat through bars 6-66, kick and crashes through bars 67-68 and hi-hat through bars 69-90.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 6-13, 15-22 and 24, and 15 more places -- 60% of every bar the kit plays. Learn that one and the song is very nearly finished.

    6
    1.......2.......3.......4.......
HH |x---x---x---x---x---x---x---x---|
SD |--------x---------------x-------|
BD |x---------------x---x-----------|
What It Takes -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

4 fills to learn, played 5 times: bars 27, 45, 60, 64 and 90.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 19 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 -- D -- 3 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  2. Through Part B and the Chorus -- 3 exercises, about 22 minutes. Open above.
  3. Through the Chorus -- 7 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  4. Through the Chorus -- 3 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  5. Bars 74-90 -- 7 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  6. The whole song -- 1 exercise, about 10 minutes.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is What It Takes?

70 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second notes. Slow enough to hear every mistake, which is why the room lets you sit at the written tempo rather than under it.

Is What It Takes hard to play on drums?

51 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 32 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

90 bars, about 5:09 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, 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 What It Takes?

4 fills to learn, played 5 times: bars 27, 45, 60, 64 and 90.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 90 BARS ANALYSED