
What You Need To Know About Playing Drums
Choosing the right drum set could be challenging if you have no idea what to look for. When aspiring drummers go to a music store to buy their first-ever set, they have too many qualifications, so they always find it hard to choose just one. However, if you know the essential qualities of the drum set Singapore has to offer, you’ll find it easier to find your future partner.
Things like space, quality of materials, price, types, and purpose should be your topmost criteria in choosing your drum set. Space limitation is one of the most common problems in a Singaporean household. This criterion usually helps in your decision-making as your house’s capacity dictates whether you’d buy a four-piece or a five-piece drum kit.
What else should you know about playing drums? Our team of experts made a comprehensive guide about what you should know about playing drums.
How to Play the Drums
It would be precarious for beginners to learn drums independently without understanding the process of doing it. If you happen to play the drums without knowing the basics, you are practicing a bad habit that could ruin your musical career.
Therefore, our team gathered the simplest but most essential steps to play the drum for beginners to follow.
Steps on How to Play Drums
1. Choose your drum set
Of course, even before figuring out how to play the drums, you must choose your drum set first. You can’t familiarize the parts in a drum set without having one yourself. As mentioned above, there are certain things that you need to consider before buying your drum set in Singapore.
2. Learn proper Gripping
Learning drums on your own could somehow become easier now since you already got your drum set. Now, it is time for you to learn how to hold your drumsticks. Gripping is the most basic drumming skill that every beginner should practice beforehand, as hitting the sticks onto the drums creates the music you want to play.
To establish a good fulcrum, you need to grip the drumsticks to control the rhythm of your every stroke and beat. You can try the traditional grip, the German grip, the American grip, and the French grip.
3. Learn Your First Rudiment
This part is somewhat tricky. Other drummers think that learning through self-study and video tutorials is enough to learn your first rudiment. However, our team always recommends enrolling in a music school to master your rudiment if you aspire to become a professional drummer in the future. It is imperative to understand those rudiments like paradiddles, closed and open rolls, and flams. These are the most crucial skill every drummer must develop to enhance their proficiency.
4. Learn rhythm and beat
In this part, you may or may not use your drumsticks. However, our team suggests using your hands in learning your rhythm and beat for the first time. In fact, you may even do this trick using your thighs instead of the drums. Move your hands and tap them onto your thighs in a seated position. This simple step could help you learn your beat and rhythm as you move your hands while listening to music.
Five Factors to Consider When Choosing a Drum Set
Budget
Drum sets differ in price, quality, and types. Budget is one crucial factor in deciding whether you would want to buy a particular drum set or not. While it is always wise to consider the price tag of the drum set, it is wiser to weigh the price range and its overall quality. Not all high-priced drum sets equal high quality. It is the same with not all affordable drum sets equal low quality. Therefore, as a buyer, you must research essential things about the drum set before purchasing it.
Types of Drum Set
It would be best if you also considered the types of drum sets you want to purchase. Our team suggests researching each type’s pros and cons to find better what perfectly suits your needs. There are acoustic drum sets, which most drummers choose. Some opt to buy electronic drum sets, hybrid drum sets, and heavy metal and jazz drum sets.
These drum sets typically vary on the sound they give off and the materials used in each of them to produce sound. However, if you are still a beginner drummer, we suggest buying a traditional acoustic drum set as it may give a better feel and set up in a less complicated way.
Set-up
Your place or home space also needs to be considered. If you plan to place your drum set in a large and spacious area, getting a five-piece drum set may be good for you. However, if you feel like your space is a little cramped up for such a setup, getting a four-piece drum set is a more considerable choice. Drum sets typically comprise various instruments and parts like cymbals. Some even come with drum cases that you might want to purchase to protect your instrument at home.
Buying Used VS. New
This is probably one of the first things that most buyers think about before purchasing their drum sets. Typically, beginners opt to buy used drum sets to save more money by doing so. However, there are far better advantages that buyers could get when buying new drum sets instead. New drum sets may come with a little higher price, but they offer warranties that used drum sets don’t offer. Their life spans are obviously longer, too, since its parts are still in an optimal condition.
Purpose
Usually, your playing experience holds a crucial factor in choosing the right drum set for you. You could be a beginner or a drummer who wants to follow the steps of your favourite drummers. You also need to identify whether you only want a drum set for your everyday practice or a drum set you could use on stage one day.
Let’s Wrap Up
If you are preparing to pursue your music career in drumming or looking for something to de-stress yourself from schoolwork, having drum lessons will work with your pace. Besides reducing your stress, playing drums can also relieve your frustration and disappointment. It would even boost your brainpower and increase your motor skill development.
Our team also suggests that instead of learning drums on your own, enrolling in a well-established music school like the Cristofori, Singapore’s leading music school today. If you want to know more about their first-class education for learning drums or the drum set Singapore has to offer, you have to check out their official website.