Planet drum
  • Home
  • Meet us
    • Book a taster
    • Teachers
    • Students
    • About us
    • Social Media
    • Privacy policy
  • Courses
    • Prices
    • Crash courses >
      • 短期集中コース
      • 速成课程
      • Cours intensifs
      • Crashkurse
      • Corso Intensivo
      • Cursos Intensivos
    • Workshops
    • Drum lessons
    • Guitar lessons
    • Piano lessons
    • Bass lessons
    • Singing lessons
    • Saxophone lessons
    • Trumpet lessons
    • Children
    • Songwriting Lessons
    • Music Production
    • Team building
  • Gift vouchers
  • Blog
  • Resources
    • Faq
    • Trinity exams
    • Practice rooms
    • Iconic Drummers
    • Online drum lessons
    • Metronome
    • Site map
  • Contact

In Order to Dance

18/1/2018

Comments

 

Not all music is made to dance to, but all drumming is dancing,

even if the rhythm is so abstract the drummer is the only dancer in the room.
While there are some instances where being the only dancer in the room makes (sort of) sense, free improv, ambient, or introducing rhythms that are exotic and whose kinetic potential takes time for the audience to understand, rhythm is at its most powerful when it is able to infect a room with a pulse that compels you to move.
Notwithstanding the inertia-dictating set-up of most jazz venues today, jazz was created as dance music, not as music for chin-stroking-intellectuals, unwilling to even move to tap their feet.
As dance and music evolved from jazz into a myriad of styles, those who were firmly stuck to their seats took refuge in an academic approach to listening that froze their bodies even further.
​
Picture

Samuel Beckett once wrote: 'Dance First, Think Later'.

It seems that some people have taken Beckett's line as confirmation that it's impossible to do both at the same time, a perfect excuse to not move and look down on dance music as self-evidently 'thoughtless'.
However, thought drives action, and in her book Unthought, Katherine Hayles describes how certain impulses bypass the mind to work directly on the body. Rhythm is one such impulse and can go straight from the source to your body. A stubborn insistence on filtering rhythm through the mind before it's allowed to twitch your muscles merely breaks the direct link between reality and experience; the synergy between performer and audience.
The result of such broken synergy is often a room full of people gasping to understand what is happening on a stage where a band is too busy playing to themselves to notice they have an audience.
Picture

That music can be highly complex,

challenging, thought provoking and fuse styles from around the world without compromising on its body-moving force is apparent in electronic dance genres such as Chicago Footwork, Grime, UK Bass and jungle.
To get people moving, perhaps more drummers should dance first, think later, get rid of seats at gigs, go clubbing more often and remember the words of Funkadelic: Free Your Mind, Your Ass Will Follow!

Merijn Royaards, performer, electronic musician and drum teacher
Picture
Comments

    Join us and send us your comments.

    It doesn't matter who you are or where you come from, there's something for everyone here.

    Blog

    Archives

    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016

    Categories

    All
    Bands
    Bass
    Bassist
    Bass Lessons
    Bass Lessons In London
    Blog
    Creativity
    David Bamford
    Drum Exams
    Drumming
    Drums
    Drum Tutoring
    Event
    Exams
    Exercises
    Female Drummers
    Guitar
    Improvisation
    Keith Debarra
    Live Music
    Masterclass
    Metric Modulation
    Modlam Motel
    Motivation
    Music Exams
    Music Grades
    Newsletter
    Percussion
    Performance
    Planet Drum Studios
    Polyrhythms
    Practice
    Saxophone
    Singing
    Songwriting Course
    Taster Lesson
    Theatre
    Theatre Production
    The Lost Disc
    Trinity College London
    Trumpet
    Trumpet Lessons
    VLOG
    Workshops

    RSS Feed

London's finest drum and percussion school - South Bank Diary
Read our Privacy policy
Call now
Email
Buy a taster

Courses

FAQ
Drum lessons
Band classes
Piano lessons
Guitar lessons
Bass lessons
Sax lessons

Blog

Joining a band
Drum lessons in Camden
Buying drums
Tuning drums
Recording drums
​Hit like a girl
​
Do your grades

Network

Social media
​Twitter
Youtube
Facebook
Instagram
Flickr
​Google
  • Home
  • Meet us
    • Book a taster
    • Teachers
    • Students
    • About us
    • Social Media
    • Privacy policy
  • Courses
    • Prices
    • Crash courses >
      • 短期集中コース
      • 速成课程
      • Cours intensifs
      • Crashkurse
      • Corso Intensivo
      • Cursos Intensivos
    • Workshops
    • Drum lessons
    • Guitar lessons
    • Piano lessons
    • Bass lessons
    • Singing lessons
    • Saxophone lessons
    • Trumpet lessons
    • Children
    • Songwriting Lessons
    • Music Production
    • Team building
  • Gift vouchers
  • Blog
  • Resources
    • Faq
    • Trinity exams
    • Practice rooms
    • Iconic Drummers
    • Online drum lessons
    • Metronome
    • Site map
  • Contact