Drummer "can't count" right.

[Madhouse27]

I can't wait to use the term "go-arounds" at my next jam session.

 

[DWBass]

One drummer I played with couldn't count at all. He even asked me NOT to count when we were trying to work something out. Odd. Played with another drummer who transitioned at odd measures throwing everyone off. Played with another who had an habit of clicking off at a different meter than the song was actually in. Very odd.

 

[AztecViking]

Sounds like your drummer can count but only in complete groups of 4.

I knew a drummer who said that if he did count it was mostly subconcious and he said thinking about the count too much was a distraction to actually "feeling it". That guy could play anything too. Even the old insane metered Mahavishnu Orchestra stuff.

He could actually break odd metered things into easily comprehensible bits for those who were baffled by them. That guy was like a duck in water with rhythms of any sort.

 

[silky smoove]

Played with another who had an habit of clicking off at a different meter than the song was actually in. Very odd.

I too have experienced this one. This guy's count in was always at around 120-130bpm regardless of actual song tempo. It was weird for songs that were slower than that, but it was flat-out bizarre for tunes that were faster than that with the now to slow count-in. Very odd indeed!

 

[sm49341]

I live with this too. Count tempo is frequently not always what the song tempo is. Plus if a song has a pre song drum lick, often times two beats, what a normal person would do is two clicks then the 2 beats of drum and then start. But no, he does 4 clicks, plays two beats, then we all start.
After numerous attempts to explain, I guess I decided that as long as we all start together I'll live with it. I've come to realize that for the most part people are what they are, and I just deal with it. He's a pretty solid drummer over all and a very respectful and responsible guy with no baggage or wierd issues. I'll take him any day. IDK Maybe not everyone has the counting sense I do.

 

[azureblue]

he calls it a go round, you call it a repeat. Some may say the dominant, some may say the V7, some may say E7. It's all terminology. Welcome to the real world of bands - not everybody uses the same terminology. Learn to speak his language - it won't kill you, you know. As far a getting confused on pickup notes, why do you make a point of it when you can simple say, ?Back up a couple of measure before the go around, where the words (or some cue) are xxxx"?

But you want terminology hell, just try explaining to classically trained string players the theory behind a jazz tune. V of V7, ii of vi. etc.

 

[SLO Surfer]

I'm in a 10-piece Afrobeat band. It's made up of me, with a degree in music, an amazing percussionist/drummer from Ghana, another top percussionist of my area with no western music training at all, and some college horns and a few other people who have never even been in a band before. There's a wide range of musicianship in this group, and some people have different terms and ideas of how music works. We make it work by communicating. If someone isn't getting something then we try to communicate it another way. If that doesn't work we ask them to come to our thought process or terminology. There are some songs where we all feel beat 1 in different places. I know beat 1 is where it is, but it feels like the "and of 2" on one song. For several songs, after the count in, in I reset beat one in my mind to where I feel it. Whatever, as long as the music sounds good and you all start and end together.

Try to communicate on his level, and if it's not working try to communicate another way, or try to teach him how you are thinking about it. Maybe teach him to feel a half turn around?

 

[Ewo]

odd...i've mostly run into _guitarists_ who didn't count bars of four beats. drummers usually seemed to have that concept down (count four beats to a bar, count bars in a phrase, count phrases in a verse or chorus).

well, a couple exceptions, yeah...

 

[And I]

Worst for me was playing with people who INSISTED they had studied music theory but couldn't count and didn't actually know any music theory.

 

[Hand slap]

In my band our drummer has an issue with how he counts phrases that cause some confusion with the rest of the band. For example, in any song with a repeating pattern that spans multiple measures he refers to as "go-arounds". The rest of us count in actual measures. If a tune has a four bar phrase and repeats 4 times we will say that is a 16 bar section while he refers to it 4 "go-arounds". While that works ok if everything starts and stops on one, anything like a pickup, or that ends in the middle of a bar causes endless confusion. He has never really had any former musical training, though he has taken lessons over the years.

Once passing the hurdle of making him understand that this is a problem, whatresources are available to help him learn what he is missing?

I have similar situations, my drummer, and guitar player, both are good musicians, but used different terms, and expressions, to describe, sections, of the song, typically we just use phrases like verses, chorus, lead breaks, etc, and figure things out in a language everyone can understand.

 

[Hounddog409]

In my band our drummer has an issue with how he counts phrases that cause some confusion with the rest of the band. For example, in any song with a repeating pattern that spans multiple measures he refers to as "go-arounds". The rest of us count in actual measures. If a tune has a four bar phrase and repeats 4 times we will say that is a 16 bar section while he refers to it 4 "go-arounds". While that works ok if everything starts and stops on one, anything like a pickup, or that ends in the middle of a bar causes endless confusion. He has never really had any former musical training, though he has taken lessons over the years.

Once passing the hurdle of making him understand that this is a problem, whatresources are available to help him learn what he is missing?

It sounds to me like you know what he's saying, so what the issue?

 

[Jloch86]

I can't count while playing. It's like concentrating on my steps when walking. Screws me up. You can't really teach these things. Either he "gets it" or he doesn't. Just have him listen to what you're trying to do over and over again.

 

[edencab]

try this method?

 

[lfmn16]

He has never really had any former musical training, though he has taken lessons over the years.

Tell him to get his money back. How the hell do you take drum lessons and not learn to count?????

 

[Ekulati]

Wow, skipped a few here, but my two cents: strange as it seems, there is some value in conceiving of musical units that encompass multiple measures. One of my current bands ran into this in a very famous song where the lead guitarist used to lose track of the underlying units and so invariably started the tune's signature lick on the wrong beat, thus forcing all of us to "adjust" to make it out of the solo. For THOSE kinds of things, larger units ("go-rounds" -- did he grow up in a trailer park or sumthin'?) can be useful. But then again, standard musical lingo is measures or bars.

I guess drummers can do go-rounds, musicians need to be able to do both.

 

[Mystic Michael]

He has never really had any former musical training, though he has taken lessons over the years. Once passing the hurdle of making him understand that this is a problem, whatresources are available to help him learn what he is missing?

Your bandmate has had music/drumming lessons...but no formal (ed: I think you meant "formal" - not "former", yes?) musical training? As far as I'm concerned, lessons are a form of formal instruction. A pity that he doesn't seem to have benefited from them enough.

My prescription? More lessons - this time focused on the rudiments of time, i.e. time signatures, codas, etc. Really.

A drummer who can't count correctly is like a marriage counselor who's been divorced seven times; like a barber with a terrible haircut; like a professional diver who can't swim, etc. You get the idea...

MM

 

[LowActionHero]

I had a drummer who counted measures at the back end of a measure rather than the top. So instead of counting something like 1,2,3,4 - 2,2,3,4 - 3,2,3,4 - 4,2,3,4 as many of us do, or even just a constant 1,2,3,4 while counting measures separately, he would do this confusing mess: 1,2,3,1 - 1,2,3,2 - 1,2,3,3 - 1,2,3,4.

Counting that without the spaces makes it look way more confusing as a count: 1,2,3,1,1,2,3,2,1,2,3,2,1,2,3,3,1,2,3,4... Yeah...

What would invariably happen is that if you said "measure 3" to him, he wouldn't be able to immediately know where that was without playing up to his three count, which was a quarter note before we entered measure 4. Very odd.

count: 1,2,3,1,1,2,3,2,1,2,3,2,1,2,3,3,1,2,3,4

Pretty sure that's how Neil Peart counts...

Or Dream Theater

 

[MDBass]

In my band our drummer has an issue with how he counts phrases that cause some confusion with the rest of the band. For example, in any song with a repeating pattern that spans multiple measures he refers to as "go-arounds". The rest of us count in actual measures. If a tune has a four bar phrase and repeats 4 times we will say that is a 16 bar section while he refers to it 4 "go-arounds". While that works ok if everything starts and stops on one, anything like a pickup, or that ends in the middle of a bar causes endless confusion. He has never really had any former musical training, though he has taken lessons over the years.

Once passing the hurdle of making him understand that this is a problem, whatresources are available to help him learn what he is missing?

Not sure why an anticipation based groove would cause confusion for anyone, but something that ends in the middle of a bar is neither a four bar phrase that repeats four complete times nor 16 even bars

Personally the drummer's way of feeling it is more musical to me, if it actually is a repeating four bar phrase, as I can't remember the last time I counted 16 bars in my head while playing a tune..."go-arounds" is certainly a funny way to refer to it though

It sounds to me like everyone needs to learn to communicate more specifically, what terminology you use shouldn't really matter if someone says "stop on beat three of the last bar" or whatever the specific direction may be.

 

[lokikallas]

I once met a drummer who said he didn't count, but rather did it by "feel". That didn't take too long before I had to dump that project.

 

[jalapejoe]

I'm in a band the Drummer and I are pretty solid and I don't count anything, I go by feel and memory and kick drum beats. he counts I believe, but I don't. I just learn the cover tune and I remember how it goes and remember the changes? Maybe I should start counting or learn. Ok so how do you count, play and sing backups all at once is my next question? We play allot of tunes that have allot of harmonies we are all pretty actively singing. I play bass and sing the lows.

Joey