Excelsior Basics: The Ultimate Drumming Fundamentals Course

Learn essential gear and setup for the acoustic drum kit (and electric options), including drumsticks, snare stands, a practice pod, hearing protection, and selecting quality equipment.

Warm up with an ergonomic posture, adjust seat height, relax shoulders, and find a neutral spine and home position, then master matched grip, balance, and controlled stick motion.

Learn core drumming hand techniques, including the gladstone rebound, controlled bounces, molar and half-molar variations, and the roll model, with emphasis on grip, resets, and seamless patterns.

Explore the fundamentals of reading music for drummers: notes, rests, pulse, bars and measures, time signatures, note values like quarter, eighth, sixteenth notes and triplets, and metronome practice.

Develop timing and rhythmic reading by practicing the rhythmic scale—from quarter notes to sixteenth notes and triplets—with a metronome, centering rests and syncopation on snare etudes.

Master six essential drum rudiments, including single stroke rolls, double stroke rolls, flam accents, single drag, and buzz rolls, to build a core vocabulary and precise technique through slow-to-fast practice.

Learn to tune drums by making each head match itself, find the sweet spot, and use a piano app or drum dial to measure tension.

Develop a clear understanding of kit setup for drumming within the Excelsior basics course, introducing the fundamentals of arranging and preparing the drum kit for practice.

Master heel down and heel up pedal techniques for bass drum and hi-hat, releasing the beater to breathe and resonate. Develop alternating and unison foot exercises for jazz and swing.

Explore tension and release bass drum techniques with a single pedal, mastering rebound strokes, heel up and heel down variations, leg-driven power, and grouping patterns for higher volume and control.

Explore bass drum technique with a double pedal, building feet coordination through rudiments, sticking patterns, and grouped exercises to develop coordination, control, and time for double bass drumming.

Master quarter-note, eighth-note, and sixteenth-note grooves through rhythmic pyramid drills, triplets, and fills while coordinating snare, bass drum, and hi-hat with metronome-tested timing.

Develop eight-note high-hat ostinato grooves with stick techniques from tip to edge for thickness and texture. Practice two-bar and four-bar fills, crash accents, hat dynamics, and acrostic patterns.

Explore sixteenth-note grooves and fills for single-handed and two-handed drumming, using ostinatos, sixteenth-note permutations, and dynamic accents to develop coordination with bass drum and hi-hat.

Master triplet and compound grooves by exploring subdivision, counting in 12/8, and building bass drum patterns and fills through permutations for versatile drum parts.

Explore the shuffle groove in triplet, compound time, with hand ostinatos, varied patterns, ghost notes, backbeats, and two-handed techniques, including jazz-inflected approaches and classic examples.

Master four levels of learning and build effective practice habits for drumming through a practical framework, chunking, and deliberate, focused repetition with a metronome to develop unconscious competence.