LESSON PLAN: Drum Fills Accompanied
Objective
Students will be able to use “call and response” to communicate a drum fill from either guitar or keyboard to the drum set.
Resources
Only a drum kit!
Procedures
- After completing the lesson plans “Rhythms Made Easy With Words” and “Drum Fills That Lead to a Crash”, students will be aware of using these rhythms. Review them with your guitar or keyboard students having them play them with strum patterns or piano chords using “call and response”.
- Similar to what we did in “Drum Fills That Lead to a Crash”, the drum fill will be in the same place—the last measure of a four measure chord progression. Only this time, the guitar or keyboard player will play the fill first on his instrument in the third bar while the drummer listens and then attempts to play the same fill he just heard in the fourth bar! It’s a good idea when starting this exercise to have the students say the names of the rhythms as they use them so that communication is very clear. As a teacher you can hear if they’re having a problem with a particular rhythmic concept, and at the same time the words allow students to not take themselves so seriously when trying this.
- Once students get the hang of this, have the drummer end HIS/HER fill with a cymbal crash. If this is difficult the first couple times you can add it later, but keep in mind that fills almost always lead to a cymbal crash. Any one of us would be hard pressed to find an example of one that doesn’t. In this exercise the cymbal crash will always correspond with beat one of the first measure, “announcing” the beginning of the repeat—which is what cymbal crashes are SUPPOSED to do!
- Tell the guitar or keyboard player to reinforce the rhythm of the fill by playing it along with the drummer in the fourth bar. This helps exaggerate the sound of the fill, giving music a sense of tension that MUST resolve with a cymbal crash and then two measures of CALM! This exercise uncovers one of the things about instrumental music that draws us in—the constant cycle between tension and resolution—two measures of boringness followed by two measures of chaos, injecting music with the illusion that it MUST continue! We’ve got to hear more and we have no idea why! What fun!
National Core Arts Standards (Music)
Anchor Standard 1: Generate and conceptualize artistic ideas and work. Example: General Music MU:Cr1.1.1 a. With limited guidance, create musical ideas (such as answering a musical question) for a specific purpose. Anchor Standard 4: Select, analyze, and interpret artistic work for presentation. Example: General Music MU:Pr4.2.6 a. Explain how understanding the structure and the elements of music are used in music selected for performance. Anchor Standard 7: Perceive and analyze artistic work. Example: Harmonizing Instruments MU:Re7.2.H.8a (Intermediate) Describe how the way that the elements of music are manipulated and knowledge of the context (social and cultural) inform the response. Common Core Correlation: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.9-10.5Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure a text, order events within it (e.g., parallel plots), and manipulate time (e.g., pacing, flashbacks) create such effects as mystery, tension, or surprise.