The Best of Modern Drums Band 1: Drumset Book & CD

A survey of contemporary grooves with authority and swagger. The material breathes like actual playing sessions: grooves you hear on records, variations you can deploy immediately, and the technical precision that separates competent timekeeping from compelling pocket playing.

Intermediate drummers ready to move beyond basics into modern groove vocabulary across funk, rock, pop, and fusion contexts. This book suits drummers working toward a more stylistically aware practice, especially those interested in the aesthetic and technical approaches of contemporary working drummers.

• Record yourself playing along with the CD tracks so you can hear whether your pocket sits solidly with the playback and identify timing inconsistencies before they become habits.
• Study the credited drummer styles (Phillips, Garibaldi, Starks, Vega, Erskine, Hakim) separately through recordings; matching the feel from this book will deepen once you hear the originals.
• Work the patterns at a slower tempo first using a metronome, then sync with the CD once the hand-foot coordination feels automatic.
• Isolate the kick drum and hi-hat parts on their own before combining them; many players rush the integration and lose the independence these grooves demand.

Assign this as a directed-study text for drummers between band season or concert cycles, or integrate specific patterns into full-band arrangements to establish a cohesive rhythmic foundation across multiple styles. The CD support makes it viable for independent practice outside sectional rehearsals.

• Funk, rock, pop, and fusion groove patterns and their variations
• Kick drum and hi-hat independence within contemporary contexts
• Reading and executing polyrhythmic and syncopated drum notation
• Matching articulation and feel to recorded references
• Transitioning smoothly between related grooves within a style