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This is a completely free course of drum set instruction. My objective at this web site is to provide the absolute BEST free drum instruction in the World. Money is NOT the prime objective here. I have no advertising budget at all. If content is still king here on the web, you will find me easily. If not, then YOU will lose and we can legitimately blame the greedy search engines.

These lessons have all been hand written and individually prepared by me in private classes with thousands of face-to-face students. This entire course of instruction has evolved over a 45 year period of time since I began teaching privately in 1965. It has been online since 1995 and is considered by many to the very best in the world.

If this course of instruction were shrink-wrapped and placed on 25 CDs it would sell for $500. It isn't shrink-wrapped, because it's mostly free. A $45 donation fee is required if you want to download the 125-lesson course along with 4 other e-book courses. Donate and download it instantly if you want it.

I'm Bill Powelson, the author of this web site. That old picture you see on the top-right was me, back in the big-hair 80's. The one on the left was taken in 1995. I'm much older now. Cameras tend to 'leave skid-marks' when they see me coming, these days. As I write this in 2014, I'm now 72-years-old.

Enter the lesson menus now and begin studying with no tricks, no sign-ups or other gimmicks. It really is free! This entire project survives on your considerate donations. Without your generosity, it will fail. I'm now getting on in years. I hope and fully intend to pass this entire project to my heirs on my inevitable departure from this world. I want it to remain online forever if possible. However; if it fails to generate enough money to keep itself afloat, it will most likely disappear. Permanent students needn't worry. If you have the downloads, you have it all. You'll be able to study each lesson from your own computer system without being online. Everything advertissed here is freely downloadable from within the members-only password site. So, if you have the downloads, these lessons will be accessible to you, no matter what happens to me, or this web site. The only people who will lose will be those who HAVEN'T DONATED to get the downloads.

How this course came to be:
It occurred to me early in the mid-1960s that there was a definite need for home study drum courses like these you will find at the web site. I realized then, that we do not necessarily need to see the teacher face-to-face in a class-room, in order to learn. It's all about the material being taught and the manner in which it is presented that counts. It was at that time that I began putting these courses of drum set techniques together. There was nothing like this available anywhere in the world at that time.

I was unable to launch it successfully until the web appeared in the early 90's. As soon as I saw the Internet blossoming in 1994, I put it all online. It was the FIRST and only course of it's kind to hit the web, way back then. It has been updated many numerous times since 1994 and I'm currently in the middle of what will probably be the final update.

As you study the lessons, you'll discover the true value. The hidden value is in the teaching approach. It has taken nearly 50 years of constant daily tinkering, to find the easiest and most efficient teaching techniques. The courses are all designed to make the learning process EASIER to follow yet more effective and efficient than anything you will find anywhere in the world. You may not discover that until you compare apples to apples.

To save you years of frustration in your learning quest, I strongly advise you to study all these lessons, if you want to make the most progress in the MOST FUN way. The mark of a good teacher is evident in fact that you will learn MORE in fewer lessons, with the least amount of frustration and the most amount of fun.

You will not discover a lot of boring drill, here. You will find that your coordination and mental development will definitely occur much faster, easier and effectivly, my carefully honed way. Like I said, these lessons have been in daily developent since the mid-1960s. You will discover nuggets of wisdom (secrets) of which lesser experienced teachers are totally unaware.

With a little fortitude, some positive awareness, common sense, and just the right lessons, it is often easier, faster and more efficient for the student to learn on their own at their own speed. These five separate courses have been painstakingly designed over a 45/50 year period with that philosophy in mind: . . . ONE-PRECIOUS-STUDENT-AT-AT-A-TIME.

Simply MAKE A BOOKMARK and visit the site as time allows. Investigate all 4 lesson menus. Pursue your dream of playing drums as a hobby or a career, one-lesson-at-a-time. Start at the top of lesson menu #1, if you are a beginner. You'll gain approximately 30 to 60-years of ON-STAGE (working) knowledge in as little as 6-months (or less) with this method of instruction. If you are a self-starter, and if you can follow the simple (middle school level) instructions, I think you'll quickly accelerate through the entire course with ease. Plus; as long as I'm alive, I'll always be standing-by to help via e-mail, should you need it.

Age is simply not a factor when we study music. I've produced some amazing 4-year-old drummers over the years. Yet, it is common to see a lot of seniors FINALLY discovering their dreams of drumming too, after a full life of "responsible" living. A word of encouragement to all who are older:

"Your years with your good ears working, count as experience and practice."

In other words, you have been listening to music all your life and probably your hands and feet were going full blast all the while. Without knowing it, you were studying the rhythms of music (the natural way) all those years. It will help immensely as you scoot through these lessons. You will learn quicker and faster than most.

PRO DRUMMERS! You may have played half your life 'by ear' and 'by feel', but now you feel a need to study and polish the academics. Rest easy! These lessons are tailored for you too, by a guy who has lived in those very same shoes. The most difficult part is probably the terminology. Memorizing names! Yes, there are technical and street-names for just about everything we do. In many cases, you pro-drummers will move quickly through the lessons, because you may already know a lot of the techniques. It's mostly the 'formal' beat and fill/roll names you will learn, along with a full understanding of note-values and the time signature system itself.

TIP: Listen to the sound files and watch the videos. As you do that; mentally attach the names of the various note-values, rolls and beats.

Reading notation will come easier than you can imagine here. You will grow into it in a different way from the old traditional method books you have probably seen on the shelves. Here, you'll most likely be learning things you probably have played onstage, you'll hear the sound files, see the notation . . . and you will 'GET IT', INSTANTLY. It works in the same 'near magic' way for beginners as well.

Quite honestly, I've found that the best way to really learn the academics is to begin teaching, for fun. Teach relatives, kids in the neighborhood and anyone who wants to learn. Before you know it, you'll be hanging out your own "Drum Instructor" shingle. See my e-book course, The Drum Instructor's Guide! It will get you into the teaching gig on a shoestring. It can be done with absolutely no investment. You should and could be teaching already if you are a reasonably adequate drummer! My e-book will give you a kick-start.

Anyway; as you delve deeper into the academics, you'll definitely want to read " Musical Time: Finite to Infinity". Seven short lessons! At the end you'll be disgusted someone didn't teach you all that when you were still in grade-school. It's that easy! But, the rewards of that knowledge are absolutely phenomenal. You'll see and understand 18 quintillion different and very usable song-beat patterns on the full drum set, within a relaxing 2-hour read. 18 quintillion! That's every beat variation of every time signature in the musical universe. We will view it all from a totally different perspective, (ie; the drummer's perspective)!

That enlightening study ("Finite to Infinity") places all those patterns where they need to be; within your imagination! Simple, easy formulas (and proofs) make it easy to visualize EVERYTHING; like seeing the forest for the first time, from the top down; rather from the ground up. Of course there's absolutely no way anyone will ever master such a number (18 quintillion) , but this understanding will lead any drummer OUT OF THE RUT forever and into the most imaginative playing-jamms they've have ever experienced.

Yep; that little e-book may cause some controversy for awhile as the traditional educators come to grips with the simple, easy TRUTH it exposes, concerning rhythms and musical time. All of our music-educators have been seeing rhythm the wrong way for over 500 years. The simple truth is; if they REALLY understood it, they should have and would have written this little e-book, (several hundred years ago).

WARNING! If your competition reads it first, you lose! You will be wise to investigate my e-book: "Finite to Infinity" whether you are a beginner, a pro-drummer, or a college music-education professor. It is pure dynamite!

To learn more about me personally, please visit my biography page.

E-MAIL:
I absolutely love receiving e-mail from serious, appreciative, students.
In the old days of this course; I had my e-mail address plastered on nearly every web page and I literally begged for e-mail responses. It kept me busy most of the time and I loved it. Then came the spam and 'Spamannoya'.

These days, no one wants to expose their e-mail address any more, for fear of getting on yet another 'spam list', (. . . myself included). If you weren't around in the 90s, e-mail was at one time the greatest thing about the web and the Internet. The spammers ruined that for everybody! I've removed and disguised my e-mall address. I DO want to hear from you and I still beg for e-mail. It's a matter of caution now, because of those same spammers and spambots, that make a business of harvesting e-mail addresses from the web. I'm on far too many spam lists already. But; please DO E-mail me!

If you'll use the mail-form to e-mail me just ONE TIME, I'll give you my e-mail address and we will communicate directly with e-mail, after that.

Sure! I'm encouraging you to write! If I'm still kicking and screaming, I'll usually respond within an hour or two.

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