Studio Drummer – Be on your toes

*YOU HAVE TO BE FAST AND HAVE THE ABILITY TO SWITCH GEARS AND INTERNALIZE MUSICAL CHANGES TO YOUR PART QUICKLY AND WITH FLUIDITY AND CONIFIDENCE IN YOUR PLAYING.* 

There are several mental tricks that I have used continuously over the years to combat building stress or anxiety.  The first one is this.

*DON’T FIXATE.*

By fixating I mean dwelling on a specific part of your playing or a specific limb. 

As a pilot in my flight training that I’ve done for instrument flying I was taught that one of the most important things to avoid and never do when flying by instruments is that you never fixate on one instrument. 

You should be scanning all the instruments almost in a steady rhythm.  But you never dwell on a single instrument.  This can cause you to lose control of the aircraft.  In our profession this is also true when you’re getting ‘too inside’ a specific part. 

It often happens on a session where you’re playing something very simple part-wise but challenging from an accuracy standpoint.  It can be very easy to over think your part in a case like this.

For example you start to think too much about your bass drum foot or hi hat foot and next thing you know you’re complicating something that is usually easy for you to execute.

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Studio Drummer – Uninhibited!

*STRIVING TO BRING A GREAT PERFORMANCE ON ALL LEVELS, A COMPLETELY UNINHIBITED PERFORMANCE, INTO A WORLD OF UNKNOWNS!*

This is an obvious ideal!  One can’t bring this every time into a situation of unknowns.  It’s an ideal that we all strive for and sometimes we hit the mark and some times we fall short.

There are many variables and many unknowns.  I’ve also found Murphy’s Law at work here in my own experience. 

*THE MORE COMFORTABLE AND RELAXED I AM COMING INTO A SESSION, THE MORE I’M GOING TO GET SLAMMED AND NOT PERFORM TO MY POTENTIAL! *

So I try to never enter a session with this mindset.  In a sense it’s like underestimating an opponent.  When you think about it, it’s very much like the mindset of a professional athlete.

If I don’t personally prepare and be in a sort of pain state, a healthy nervous state, the less likely I am to be properly prepared mentally for a session.  It tends to be a prerequisite to a successful session.

That is generally the life of a session musician. 

A good friend and great session guitarist friend said to me that you have to be careful of this because in a sense the circumstances can seem stacked against you.  One only needs a bad day, slightly off your game and kaboom, you’re off the A list so to speak.  And yet as he said it’s part of the craft and part of the challenge!

Jingle sessions can often embody this strongly.   The first thing to conquer is that you’re playing full on at 9.00 am in the morning.  Perhaps you’ve had too much coffee (although not in my case!) or you’re just trying to wake up in general. 

I remember jingle and movie sessions at 9am that were very challenging, where I was playing material that pushed me right to the edge of my limits and abilities. Another example of this situation was on sessions for Electronic Arts video game productions.   

Different session situations tax different areas. 

I’m paraphrasing here but as an all time great session drummer Jeff Porcaro once said, “Experience, experience, is the real teacher of how to handle the many situations a session drummer is confronted with.”

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Studio Drummer – Pressure situations

DEALING WITH PRESSURE

The environment a session musician exists in is most often unlike that of being in a band or being strictly a ‘live’ musician.  There are different types of pressures that apply to this environment.

Being in a band is a very familiar and most often, a rehearsed situation.  You don’t necessarily need reading ability to be in a band.  And similarly you don’t need the ability (learned tolerance as I would call it) of walking into a pressure-situation without knowing anything about what you’re walking in to. 

*I USE THE TERM “LEARNED TOLERANCE” BECAUSE YOU NEVER REALLY GET USED TO IT OR COMFORTABLE WITH IT, NOR SHOULD YOU.* 

It is something that you can learn to deal with though and in your own way prepare for. 

For example, if I have a session coming up that is causing me anxiety I never have coffee on the day of that session.  If I know the players, I will work emotionally and mentally to diffuse issues of insecurity and tension. 

These types of issues, as in every relationship, tend to crop up.  If you’re not prepared for relational issues and don’t have your game face on so to speak, you can be put in vulnerable positions. 

My intention when I walk into the session is to be prepared on every level, not only playing and reading but emotionally prepared as well.  That’s just one small example and of course everyone is different and handles stress in a different manner.

*THIS KIND OF PERFORMANCE ANXIETY CAN BE PAINFUL AND YET IT’S A HELPFUL PROCESS THAT RAISES YOUR ABILITY TO A HIGHER LEVEL OF FUNCTIONALITY.*

There are times when this can be very intense.  You’ll lose some sleep I guarantee it!  When I played with Ray Charles I definitely lost some sleep as I did with the David Foster Band.  When we backed up Toto I most definitely lost some sleep! 

The standards are very high, about as high as they can get.  But something happens in these situations.  You’re so aware and so on.  It’s a place you can’t get to on your own without this tremendous back pressure.

But back to the studio;

A typical recording session would be this.  You are given the session start time and place.  From here you typically don’t know;

The complexity of what you’re playing…

What particular style you’re playing…

What session players you’re playing with…

How your kit and/or tuning will translate in that particular studio..

If I’m playing a studio’s drum kit, what is the condition, tuning, hardware like etc…

Who’s producing or engineering, what’s the artist/client like…

If you could perhaps sum up the experience of being a session drummer or session musician in a sentence, from my perspective it would be this;

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Studio Drummer – Getting Experience, Rise To The Challenge!

*BUT YOU SHOULD RISE TO THE CHALLENGE AND TRY!*

If you’re unable to accomplish it then alter the part slightly so that it is comfortable.  They may or may not even notice that you’ve done this.

This has happened to me many times in the studio on pressure filled sessions.  I get asked to play something that I wouldn’t normally play and I have to play it!  I have to get comfortable with it.  One specific producer used to do that to me all the time!  As I also mention in the chapter on technique, you have to be very analytical as a session drummer.

If you’re uncomfortable with something very specifically analyze what it is that is making you feel that way.  This can often result in the correction of the issue.  This is what I do personally in all areas of my playing in the studio.  I try to be as analytical as I can in a positive sense.

For myself, if I find that I can’t play something exactly as it’s being asked I will modify it slightly and again often the artist or producer isn’t aware that I’ve done that.

The same issue can arise on the chart.  You might be making the same mistake repeatedly on the chart.  Stop and quickly analyze where you are making the error and why.  Fix it.  Refer to the chapter on reading where I go deeper into this issue.

*DON’T PANIC.  ANALYZE AND CORRECT THE PROBLEM.*

You will also notice the effect on your playing and your ability to groove and sit in a pocket when other players are rushing or dragging!  The effect is often drastic!  And again on the flip side of this it may be you who is rushing or dragging in this situation.  You’ll experience headphone-monitoring issues.  Some instruments will be too soft or too loud and you won’t have enough click level for example.

For all of these reasons it’s vital to get in a room with 2 other players or more and work through the myriad of issues that will ensue.

FINALLY…

In the area of experience you have to be creative.  You HAVE to create your own situations to garner experience.  No one is going to do that for you!

How can you convince an artist or producer to utilize your abilities?  Think of every possible creative scenario that you can!

*IF YOU’RE DEDICATED AND PATIENT, THE DAY WILL COME WHEN YOU’RE DISCUSSING YOUR PRICE POINT WITH CLIENTS!*

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