Introduction Starters That Guy Next to Me Bucket Rock blue muffin Tuesday Intermediate...

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Introduction Starters That Guy Next to Me Bucket Rock blue muffin Tuesday Intermediate..."

Ernest Daniels
6 years ago
Views:

1 Contents CD Track Introduction... 3 Instruments...3 Imlements...5 Movements...6 Starters... 6 That Guy Next to Me Bucket ock blue muin Tuesday Intermediate Strange Asaragus eavy Bucket ock Street Beat Buckets O Jig El Cubo Es Cool Advanced ocket ocket Journey o the ockwa Cruisin the B Time Bass Bucket Boogie Page Online esources...79 About the Author...80 Acknowledgments Beth Shelton (my wie) and Anna arris (my daughter): Thanks or lending your eyes and ears to this roject. Milord and Elizabeth Shelton (my arents): You endured my taing on random objects around the house and arm. Who knew? arold A. Jones (my ercussion teacher in grad school days): Your inluence is with me anytime I make music even on a lastic bucket. Yuri Star (riend and advisor): Encourager extraordinaire, thank you! 2

2 Introduction Bucket drumming has come to the elementary music classroom, with the teachers and students getting in on the un o ounding a ail. Forming a bucket ensemble is easy on the budget while roviding a great vehicle or learning rhythms and exloring tone colors. A simle (yet well-layed) bucket-drumming iece can be a real crowdleaser at a concert. Many erormers have exlored the tonal ossibilities o this common recetacle, coaxing an array o timbres rom the various suraces to create amazing imrovisations and comositions. A simle search o the web will turn u dozens o examles o ercussionists and buskers dislaying their ound sound virtuosity. Give Me a Bucket rovides you with a dozen easy-to-learn ieces or bucket ensemble, rehearsal tis, a quick bucket tutorial, and recordings or study and insiration. Your students can enjoy both olyhonic ensembles, scored or a ew assorted instruments, as well as unison ieces that can be layed by any number o erormers. When teaching and erorming the olyhonic ensembles, you can double (or trile) the arts to add to the un. The unison ieces have a certain visual aeal, as the audience sees all hands and sticks moving in sync. Go ahead set u a ew ails, hand your students some sticks, ass out the arts, and let the bucket jam begin. Instruments Tenor buckets are the workhorses o the bucket ensembles. These ive-gallon lastic ails are the industry-standard, go-to instruments or bucket music. When inverted, the bottom becomes the drumhead and the rim is ready or a crackling rim shot. The timbre and itch o the tenor bucket can be maniulated by raising and lowering the oening o the bucket in relationshi to the loor. Teaching this technique will rovide your students with a great tool or their own imrovisation and laying in general. For the oen/closed technique, the layer sits in a chair behind the instrument and laces his eet on the sides o the bucket (at the loor) so that one oot can stabilize the bucket and the other oot can lit and lower the bucket. The ollowing symbols are used in the scores to indicate bucket osition: O = Oen osition: Play these notes with the bucket oening raised at an angle to the loor. C = Closed osition: Play these notes with the bucket oening resting against the loor. O-----C = Pitch glide (oen to closed): Play the indicated notes starting in the oen osition and gradually lower the oening (using the oot) to the closed osition. C-----O = Pitch glide (closed to oen): Play the indicated notes starting in the closed osition and gradually raise the oening (using the oot) to the oen osition. I a iece calls or the bucket to remain in oen osition throughout, lace a chunk o oam rubber under the bucket to kee it roed oen at an angle. A slab about 8 4 1¾ should do the trick. 3

Bass buckets um out the low-end thum or several o these ieces. The choice or the recordings was a thirty-ive-gallon lastic trash can.

Position these instruments horizontally with the laying surace acing toward the audience.

Metal buckets can rovide a ringing sustain that contrasts the rather secco sound o the lastic buckets.

bucket lid. Try combining dierent sizes or a comosite sound.

3 Bass buckets um out the low-end thum or several o these ieces. The choice or the recordings was a thirty-ive-gallon lastic trash can. This size rovides suicient bass requencies without taking u too much sace. Position these instruments horizontally with the laying surace acing toward the audience. est the instrument on the loor and have the layer sit behind it, or lay the bucket on to o an inexensive keyboard X-stand so that the musician can stand. Metal buckets can rovide a ringing sustain that contrasts the rather secco sound o the lastic buckets. A ew dierent sizes were used or the recordings, including a six-gallon bucket, a one-gallon aint bucket, and a # 10 (three-quart) can, as well as a bucket lid. Try combining dierent sizes or a comosite sound. The one-gallon aint bucket can be held between the knees o the seated layer, while the larger metal buckets should rest on the loor. A musician can lay two bucket lids like crash cymbals or hold a single lid and strike it with the shoulder o a drumstick. Note: emove the handles rom all buckets to revent rattling during erormance. Boomwhackers share the sotlight with buckets on Strange Asaragus. The iece is scored or our tubes: C4, E4, G4, and C5. 4

When other imlements are called or, they will be indicated on the scores. owever, these are suggestions; eel ree to exeriment to ind the imlement that best serves your musical interretation.

4 Imlements The choice o laying imlements is crucial to obtaining the desired tone on any ercussion instrument, including buckets. Sticks, mallets, and brushes elicit various timbres and excite dierent harmonics based on actors such as materials, size, and weight. For the most art, drumsticks will be the imlement o choice. When other imlements are called or, they will be indicated on the scores. owever, these are suggestions; eel ree to exeriment to ind the imlement that best serves your musical interretation. Drumsticks are the most common imlements used in these comositions. Although the bead (ti) o the stick is generally used, ercussionists routinely emloy other areas. The butt o the stick will draw more lows rom a bucket, while the shoulder (the area where the drumstick taers toward the bead) works well or laying on the side o a bucket. Suitable stick sizes or buckets (and elementary-size hands) are 5A and 2B. Bundled rods are sold under various names such as Acousticks, Bundlz, and Blasticks. Several wooden or synthetic dowels are bound together in the handle area and are used to roduce a sound that has characteristics o a wire brush tone but with a more deinite attack.you could use Dreadlocks, which have braided wire instead o dowels, to create a similar eect. Fluted sticks have a ridged area over a ortion o the surace. These can be scraed over the rim o a bucket or a guiro or washboard eect. I your rhythm sticks are ridged (so you can scrae them, similar to a guiro), you ll be all set. Felt tenor mallets have less attack comared with a drumstick. The larger mallet head can bring out lower requencies, thus roducing a more mellow tone than a standard stick. This tye o mallet is requently used on multi-tenors in marching ercussion. Bass drum mallets excite the undamental and bring out the bass requencies on the low buckets. A medium-hardness elt beater with a medium to large head will rovide both attack and the desired bass resonse. Movements In some o the scores, there are suggested movements (stick moves, head turns, etc.). These are starters. Students can use their creativity and cook u some otic elements o their own. Make sure that the buckets are ositioned onstage so that the audience can see the choreograhy clearly. Using bright yellow or orange tae on the sticks and wearing black shirts can make certain visual elements o even more. 5

ThaT Guy NexT To Me The simle rhythms o this unison iece allow the students to concentrate on the sticking atterns which contribute to the visual aeal during erormance.

5 ThaT Guy NexT To Me The simle rhythms o this unison iece allow the students to concentrate on the sticking atterns which contribute to the visual aeal during erormance. Audience members will enjoy watching the coordinated movements as the erormers shit in sync rom bucket to bucket. CD 1 Gear Five-gallon lastic buckets Drumsticks Teaching and Perormance Tis Observe the stickings careully. These are essential to the sound and look o the iece. Using these atterns will acilitate the bucket-to-bucket movement that is imortant to the visual asect o the erormance. I no sticking is given, students should lay the art using alternating strokes, with the right hand starting each measure. Musicians should lay the rims in the 11:00 to 1:00 area o the heads so that the audience can see the ath o the sticks. In the score, N indicates a strike on the neighboring bucket to the layer s right, while indicates a strike on the instrument to the layer s let. All notes without these markings are to be layed on the layer s own bucket. Watch the attern careully at measures Beat 3 should be layed on the layer s own bucket. This is erhas the most challenging section, but the visual and sonic asects are worth the eort. The bucket should be layed throughout in the oen osition to allow the low requencies to resonate. While the recording maintains a constant temo, an accelerando over the last seven bars can be quite eective. Seating the layers in a straight line across the erormance area will allow the audience to see all the visual asects. Consider having the layers turn their heads to ollow their hand movements as the sticks travel rom bucket to bucket. The unison head movement creates another layer o visual interest or the audience. To heighten the eect o the stick movements, have the erormers wear black shirts and wra their drumsticks with bright yellow or orange tae. 6

6 Tenor Bucket ThaT Guy NexT To Me 1 Stick Click im ead 4 4 q = 138 or aster L L L L L L L L 4 Œ L L N N N L L L L L 7 N L L L Œ L L F N F N N F 16 Œ L L L L L 7

7 19 L L L Œ 22 oco a oco cresc L Stick Click L L L L N P N N L L L L L L L L 31 N L L L subito π 34 N ƒ Œ 8

Reckless. Eight Percussionists. Dave Hollinden

Reckless. Eight Percussionists. Dave Hollinden Score Reckless Eight Percussionists Dave Hollinden Commissioned by Philli J. Mikula and the Victoria Memorial H.S. Percussion Ensemble or remier erormance at P.A.S.I.C. 00 Aroximate duration: minutes Instrumentation