5 ways to develop a drum solo | Drum Lesson

Hey guys, what's up? Simon here! Welcome back to Thomann's Drum Bash and today I want to show you a couple of different ideas how you can start or develop a drum solo. So here we go! So the first idea is you start with one drum and then after time you add another drum, another drum and even more equipment so that you build up your drum solo in the way that you use more drums throughout your solo or cymbals of course. So I'd like to start with the snare drum because with the snare drum you have already I think about four or even five different sounds that you can use out of one drum. So you have your usual snare sound with the snares on. You can take the snares off. You have the rim of the snare and you have this side stick. And then if you want to try this one or incorporate it into your drum solo as well it's your snare wires. If you want to use this one over here, your snare wire, you can even create a sound. Cool! All right, so you have five sounds that you can create with one single drum. It's the snare drum but every drum set has a snare drum. Okay, so let me show you what I mean. I start with the different kind of snare sounds and then I'll develop something out of that and take more drums into the solo. And I'm gonna start with the snares off. Here we go! So the next idea is to split your drum set in different parts. So you draw an imaginary line, for example a vertical line or a horizontal line and then start with one of each side, whatever you just choose. And you go from there. So I take the horizontal line and in my line would be in the down part, it would be my hi-hat, snare drum, floor tom, my remote hi-hat and my crash over here. And the bass drum I will use for every part. And then my upper part would be my crash, the high tom, medium tom, ride cymbal and the crash because the line goes through the crash. All right, let's start with the down part of the drum set. Third part of drum solo developing is play with dynamics and the amount of strokes that you play from the start or in the middle or wherever. So imagine you are at the end of the chorus and the drum solo is coming next. And usually how you start drum solo is you break it down and then you build up from there. But maybe you don't want to do this because it's boring to do it every time. So you keep the level of the chorus and go straight into your drum solo. And what would be really cool actually if you keep that level for a little bit and then break it down immediately. And maybe you reduce the amount of strokes that you just played out of the chorus. So let me show you what I mean. I play a little bit of some high energy chorus beat and then I go straight into the solo. Let's say I play four bars in that high energy level and then I go straight into the solo. And then I break it down after a while. All right, here we go. Another idea is play in different time signatures. So what do I mean with different time signatures? You start in the tempo of the song and then you use a special kind of subdivision to change the tempo of your solo. For example, I play the solo. I start a solo in eighth notes or in an eighth note quarter time. It's not quarter time. In a 4-4 kind of timing with eighth notes and then I play dotted eighth notes which means I get some kind of 3-8 movement. And then I take this accented eighth note dotted thing for my new time signature. So long talking nonsense. I show you what I mean. Here we go. So I started with a normal eighth note like one and two and three and four and and then I started playing the dotted eighth notes with the right cymbal first as an introduction and then I extended it and took over that kind of timing. I'll show you or I break it down so you can better understand what I mean. So normal eighth notes in that tempo were one and two and three and four and now I add the right cymbal in that dotted eighth note pattern. One and two and three and four and and then I do it one more time and then I take off my snare or I leave out the snare so you hear the new time. Okay one more time in that kind of solo thing. I do it a little bit faster because then it sounds a little bit better and easier with the dotted eighth notes. Here we go. The last part would be you play a drum solo and use an ostinato rhythm in your drum solo. An ostinato rhythm is a rhythm that is played as a loop. The best example for an ostinato rhythm is the samba bass drum pattern which is one two three four. Okay for this one I have to open my hi-hat a little bit. It was too close and now we have a nice chick. Okay so you start maybe with the solo with the bass drum ostinato and develop your solo from there. So here we go. I do it a little bit faster. One two three four. That was the bass drum ostinato in the solo which is a very nice way to support your hands with your feet and yeah these were like five different ideas that you can develop your drum solo with. Easy ideas but they sound nice and you have a great way to start your solo and develop it further out. If you enjoyed this video leave us a like, subscribe to our channel Thomann's Drum Bash, ring the notifications and I see you in another video. Bye bye! Simon out! And here we go!