Modern drummer, a contest with a view
Modern Drummer’s Undiscovered drummer contest 2008 is in the judging-step. Editors are working on hundreds of entries submittetd from 18 year old or younger and 19 years old or older drummers from all countries. Bill Miller – modern drummer’s editor in chief – has anyway published in july MD Wire newsletter an interesting excerpt of trends and ideas listened from young drummers.
Here some relevant lines from his analysis:
“Speaking of trends, the whole left-foot clave craze seems to be dying down. (A few years ago, right after the great Horacio “El Negro” Hernandez exploded on the scene, it seemed as if every other drummer entering our contest was attempting to play it.) The other trend I noticed this year was contestants using somewhat bigger kits—three to four toms at a minimum, many cymbals, and a double pedal (but not two bass drums). And most players based their solos on a “rock groove with over-the-top fills” approach. (Very few came from a swing-style or Latin approach, for instance.)
One important point I’d like to make about several of the entries I saw was that there was a little bit too much focus on licks (in many cases just going from one to the next) and not enough on dynamics, touch, or shaping solos in interesting, musical ways. Believe me, drummers who focused on musicality–even if their technique wasn’t mindblowing–scored higher in my estimation.
I also have to admit that I preferred drummers who played a “complete solo” within the allotted two minutes and didn’t edit together various solo bits. Yes, some were expertly edited–and in a few cases the playing was outstanding. But the idea is to consider the two-minute solo as a complete piece in and of itself, not a cut-and-paste mishmash of ideas.”
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