Tag: snare drum pieces

2 Minute Snare Drum Warm Up

It feels like we’ve all moved on with out lives after Nirvana, and then all of a sudden some kid reminds us what it used to be like listening to In Bloom, by slaying the drums along to the song and then we stick on the albums again! Let us not ever move on too far. Lest us forget.

Coincidentally (not!), I wrote this snare drum warm up this morning for my drum group. We went through it today without reading it but soon it will be a reading exercise. It has most of the basics needed for levels spanning grade 1-5. Lots of different subdivisions in here to practice. You could break up the warm up and just work on one line, or 4 bars, or 1 section at a time.

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Here’s what page 2 looks like:

Piece 3 – Snare Drum Sheet Music – Book 2

For this 2 page snare drum piece there are 3 parts, A B and C. You can split up players into these groups of abilities (C is hardest). Some players could also play all three parts or just 2 parts.

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PDF Download: Piece 3 – Snare Drum Sheet Music – Book 2

Here is what Page 2, part C looks like:

Snare Drum Piece – Jan 2018

Here is some drum sheet music of a snare drum piece, which can be played by a solo snare or a snare line group.

The snare piece starts off in 3/4 timing and then moves into 4/4. There are various dynamic changes. There are also plenty of techniques involved. In bar 2 there is a flam. Bar 3 sees the first buzz roll. Bar 4 has a rim hit on the last note. Bar 8 has a drag at the end. Bar 9 and 10 are repeated 4 times and feature accents. Bar 11 starts the quietest section in pp, which means very quiet (pianissimo). Bar 12 sees the first rest, and the final techniques are found in the final bar, which are ghost notes.

Related: Group Snare Drum Piece with 3 difficulty levels (Piece 2, Book 1)

(Premium) – 10 Snare Drum and Floor Tom Pieces – Book 1

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Summary

This book was written over the course of 1 year for a group of youth drummers (Montgomeryshire Youth Music Drumline) in Powys, Wales. I have compiled the year’s pieces into an ebook that can be used by other drum teacher, or by self taught drummers. The pieces are similar to Snare Drum Sheet Music style pieces, but with the added timbre of a floor tom. You can achieve quite an epic cinematic sound by combining the two drum voices in unison. Difficulty levels from Grade 1 to Grade 3-4.

People that might find this book useful

  • Drum groups, drum workshops and drum ensembles – Youth groups or adults
  • Drum teachers are completely free to print the book or single sheets for their students.
  • Drummers can teach themselves following on from a strong basic foundation in reading and playing
  • Drummers that need to perform for school or competition etc.
  • Drummers looking to improve their rhythms for drum fills and snare drum sheet music
  • Groups of drummers can perform together using a snare and floor tom each, or by using any other two drums

Rules for sharing this content

When you purchase the book, you will receive a .pdf file that you can keep and use forever.
You can email the .pdf file privately to your students
You can print out unlimited copies for your students or for yourself
You cannot resell the .pdf or distribute the .pdf file online in any way (not even for free). This also applies to exported images, photos or scanned copies of the book

About the book

The 10 pieces are performance pieces for drums, with no backing. Drum groups, or individual drummers can perform these pieces. They have been written to sound good as standalone pieces – they are not just practice exercises. The pieces do not focus on many dynamics, but they do cover many techniques, rhythms and some rudiments, from quarter notes to sextuplets and triplets, and from flams to drags and buzz rolls.

Some of the pieces have multiple parts, which may be played together. So, if your group has varying ability levels, some can play part 1, some part 2, and some part 3. Not all the pieces have 2 or 3 parts. Please check the contents page to match up the pieces. I have compiled the book in order of difficulty. The levels go from about grade 1 up to grade 3-4 level.

Reading Tip: I developed the writing over the year. For pieces with two stave lines – the top line is the snare and the bottom line is the floor tom.

Final Thoughts

This book is a follow on from “10 Snare Drum Pieces – Book 1”, written in 2015. That book was for snare drum only, and in the last 2 years has been purchased by 60 people from all around the world, many of which are teachers themselves who are using the book to teach their students or drum groups with.

I hope this new ebook will inspire more groups of this type. I’m sure it’s not the first time it’s been done with groups of drummers, each playing a snare and floor tom, but I do think it is very rare to see it. I hope to inspire other groups to adopt this idea. I’m sure this won’t be the first and last book of it’s kind, because I intend to continue teaching the MYM Drumline for many years to come, and I will be writing new pieces for the group regularly.

Recommended reading for use with this ebook:
→ Accent Techniques – Down, Tap, Up, Full Strokes
→ Reading Buzz Rolls And Double Stroke Markings

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Snare Drum and Floor Tom Piece with Sextuplets, Single Stroke Four’s and Paradiddle-diddle’s

This piece was written for a youth drumming group but it was too difficult for them as they were not quite ready in ability. I’m sure there will be plenty of people out there that will find this a good and achievable challenge.

The drum piece will require a snare drum and floor tom, so you can play it on a regular kit, but you may need to move them closer together.

Use this piece to practice your subdivisions and rudiments, to include Sextuplets, Single Stroke Four’s and Paradiddle-diddle’s.

The left foot hi hats (X below the bottom line) are actually floor tom rims, and the X on the snare drum line is snare rim.

Group Snare Drum Piece with 3 difficulty levels (Piece 2, Book 1)

This snare drum piece has a military sound to it.When played at 90bpm, the piece is fairly short at 45 seconds and could be learned from memory with a good amount of practice. The rhythms change often so this is not easy. The primary aim for the drummer is to sight read the sheet music whilst playing.

Level 1

The first difficulty levels has cotchets and quavers, and crotchet rest. In other words, it has quarter notes, eigth notes and quarter note rests. There is one dynamic change and also some use of accents.

Level 2

The second difficulty level includes crescendo dynamics and beginner to intermediate rhythms.

Level 3

There are crescendos and other dynamic changes on the intermediate difficulty level, which also include buzz rolls and intermediate rhythms.

Related: Group snare drum piece with 3 difficulty levels (Piece 5, Book 1)
Related: (Premium) 10 Snare Drum Pieces – Book 1 – Levels 1-3

Snare Drum Sheet Music focusing on 8th note (quaver) rests

This snare drum piece focuses on using 8th note rests before playing an 8th note, so that the snare drum plays on the off beat. The off beats are combined with various rhythms that you would also find up to grade 2 level, consisting of 16th note, quarter note and 8th note combinations. There are also some snares with an X note head – these are to be played on the snare rim.

Related (Premium): (Premium) – 10 Snare Drum Pieces – Book 1 – Levels 1-3 (PDF ebooks)
Related: Snare Drum Piece with Basic Rhythms for Grade 1 Sight Reading
Related: 16 bar Snare Drum Exercise – with dynamics – Grade 1-2

Snare drum sheet music based around single stroke fours and sextuplets

This snare drum sheet is ideal for practicing the single stroke four drum rudiment and also for playing sextuplet rhythms within a piece.

The piece could be played by a group of snare drums or other drums if the players are at an intermediate level of above (at least grade 3).

There are 5 sections labeled A-E, and A is recalled at the end for a repeat. Each section should be practiced seperately and mastered before playing through the whole snare drum piece in one go.

Beginners snare drum piece lasting 8 bars

This short snare drum piece works on a few of the fundamental subdivisions and rhythms used at grade 1 level and leading up to it. The piece consists of quarter notes, 8th notes, 16th notes and quarter note rests. The performance technique of playing on the rim of the snare is also included, where the X note head is displayed instead of the usual snare.

(Premium) – 10 Snare Drum Pieces – Book 1 – Levels 1-3 (PDF ebooks)

Introduction

After a year of teaching a local youth group of drummers aged between 8 and 12, ranging from beginners to intermediate players, this collection of 10 snare drum pieces was created as an archive of this body of work.

The MYM Snare Drumline Group is an adaption of Snare Line / Drumline groups, tribal drumming, military drumming, Drum Corps, and film score music.

There are many areas left to explore for the drum group. This first book focusses on building a foundation of simple and short snare drum pieces to help give the group confidence and develop a strong sense of rhythm, timing and pulse. There is also a very small amount of dynamic use, repeats, and drum rudiments.

Demonstration of Pieces 6, 2 and 3 from the book

Here is a video of the girls in the group performing pieces (in order) 6, 2, and 3 from this snare drum book, which is an entry for the 2017 competition ‘Hit Like A Girl‘. The girl on your left is performing the level 2 pieces and the other 3 are playing from the level 3 book. At the time of video, 1 of the level 3 girls is studying grade 2 rockschool and the other two playing level 3 are studying grade 3 rockschool drums.

Level 1 Book

The Level 1 book is designed for complete beginners, or ‘basic beginners’ level. This level could also be played by players of other instruments that are new to drums.

Level 2 Book

Level 2 is designed for grade 1-2 level. The rhythms are more complex, but there are no buzz rolls or drags.

Level 3 Book

Created for grade 2-3 level drummers. It encorporates buzz rolls, drags, flams, and harder rhythms.

These books are primarily intended for groups of drummers or differing abilities. Teachers may print entire books for the students, or pick and choose pieces to suit them. Teachers or students may also use these sheets or books for single snare drum playing. Teachers may purchase this book online and print out unlimited copies for their students.

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FREE PREVIEW OF THIS EBOOK: Group Snare Drum Piece with 3 difficulty levels (Piece 2, Book 1)
FREE PREVIEW OF THIS EBOOK: Group snare drum piece with 3 difficulty levels (Piece 5, Book 1)

Recommended reading for use with this ebook:
→ Accent Techniques – Down, Tap, Up, Full Strokes
→ Reading Buzz Rolls And Double Stroke Markings