Grade 3 Drum Results

This post is a write up on my grade 3 drum exam. This is the first ‘in person’ exam I’ve sat and it took considerable cope on my part to register and turn up.

Results

Examiners comments:

Word Up was a solid performance that was rhythmically neat from beginning to end, with a strong focus on sync with the backing, clean and crisp fills, and a well balanced approach to the kit with secure coordination. 

Old Bones Blues was considerate of stylistic parameters such as accent, syncopation, accent, and rest.

There were times where the kit volume could get a little excessive, however, this was quickly regulated for a more well-balanced performance throughout each of the pieces.

Ear tests were mostly secure, and general musicianship questions were confidently answered.

Technical work was polished and distinct – well done!

A few slips in coordination and some over-the-rim strikes in ‘Play that Funky Music’ were evident. There were brief instances of stick collisions throughout, however, momentum and drive was sustained. 

Thank you for taking a Rockschool examination, David. This was an impressive attempt. I strongly encourage you to continue working hard toward grade 4.

Starting at Grade 3

I had sunk a couple of thousand hours into the piano at the time of starting the drums and as a result my teacher suggested I start at Grade 3 (skipping Premier, Debut, Grade 1 and Grade 2). The theory side of music: understanding rhythm, sight reading, method of learning etc. is all pretty much 100% transferable across and that’s the only reason I was able to start on grade 3 and get the results I did (well that and a heap of study / practise). 

Those who know me know how out of character it is for me to sit an in-person exam and how assiduously I avoid any form of public performance. I have come to understand that dealing with performance anxiety is just a problem you chip away at over time like any other.

When I think back to my early days on the piano, I was significantly (understatement) more confident in front of my drum teacher from the first lesson – even if I had no idea what I was doing.

Graded Examinations vs Performance Certificates

Most exam boards offer the choice between Graded Examinations and Performance Certificates. 

Graded Examinations

1. Three pieces – Plenty of rock/pop/blues to choose from. The versions are simplified and abridged so they’re appropriate for the grade in question. 
2. Technical Work – For the drums this is all pretty much rudiment work with a couple of fill exercises. 
3. Sight Reading or Improvisation – For sight-reading you’re given an unseen exercise of music and 90 seconds to prepare before playing it. Snare only. For Improvisation you’re given a groove and asked to play that with a stylistically appropriate series of variations and a fill. 
4. Ear Tests – Listening to a two bar phrase then playing it back. Also listening to a snare-only phrase, playing that back, then identifying which one you played from two options. 
5. GMQ – General questions about music theory. The examiner asks you to explain pieces from one of the pieces. You’re also asked to identify parts of the kit etc. If you made it through the above four items then this is pretty easy. 

Performance Certificates 

1. Five pieces only

The graded examinations are a more rigorous assessment of the quality of what you have learned. 

What to expect on exam day

You need to put a fair bit of thought into preparing yourself for ‘just getting the hell on with it’ in the exam. All of my piano exams have been digital and I think upon reflection knowing that there is no recording and no option to do-over was actually pretty liberating. 

The examiner – a concert pianist as it happens – was extremely lovely and very chatty. I owe him at least a few % of my results for his affable and engaging disposition. We did talk fair bit between pieces and exercises and he was very happy to accommodate with clarifications of some of the things he was asking for along the way. 

Arrival and Check In

I arrived 20 minutes before the exam to check in. I was shown to a practice room that had the ricketiest practice pad I’ve ever seen. They left me in here for ten minutes or so and I just tapped out the technical exercises over and over to forget about the impending exam. 

In the Exam Room

The lady handling registration collected me and walked me to a sound proof studio. 

The set up was not unlike a classroom with:

1. Teacher’s desk on one side of the room
2. Acoustic kit
3. Digital kit
4. A stage-like area presumably for people doing guitar 

As I said above, he was very friendly and welcoming and that really helped. I had to show him my original sheet music so he knew I had paid for it and handed over the registration form. 

Adjusting your Kit

You have a few minutes to adjust the kit. I was thrown a bit as the kit layout was odd (ride where most people put the second crash and a second crash kind of where you would put a ride but too far to practically reach). I did have a thought after the exam where I wondered if I had played all of the ride work on a second crash lol. You have the option to take someone with you to help adjust the kit. I seldom play on an acoustic kit so I was a bit rattled getting everything right with exam nerves. I would recommend asking your teacher to help with this on the day if they’re amenable. In retrospect I should have asked mine to come along. 

Acoustic vs Digital

You can choose an acoustic or digital kit on the day. I had already chosen to use acoustic even though I do almost all of my practise on a digital kit. Some things to think about:

1. Digital kit hi-hats are all very terrible with the exception of the Roland VH-14D. I assumed they would not have a top-line hi-hat in the studio and turned out I was correct. There is so much variation in the capabilities of digital kits I would not take the risk.
2. You’re not allowed to use headphones in the exam. I find when playing on a digital kit it is almost impossible to hear the hi-hat over the rubber thump of hitting the pad. This makes it very difficult to control dynamics. I did ask the examiner about this point as well and he agreed completely.
3. I deal with this issue at home by using a set of UltraPhones which are 3M Peltor industrial hearing protection with some Sony headphones grafted into them. These allow you to hear just the hi-hat without the rest of the mechanics of the digital kit. You can get a pair here: https://www.gk-music.com/product/ultraphones/. These significantly improved my hi-hat dynamics overnight and I cannot recommend them highly enough.  
4. In the lead up to the exam I would swap kits with my teacher randomly at lessons so between the two kits in his studio and my Roland kit at home I was rotating through three different kits randomly. I found it surprisingly easy to adjust to the exam centre’s kit on the day as a result.

Sound Check

The examiner asks you to start playing the first piece as a sound check. He had me do the first two lines of the first piece. Use this to your benefit to adjust dynamics. Also, try and sneak some other warm up work in on the actual kit under the guise of adjusting the kit. Hit everything at least a few times to get used to the sound and what you need to do to regulate. 

My results did contain commentary that my dynamics were excessive in some places but quickly regulated. He mentioned during the exam that all the children he assesses come out of the gates at infinity bajillion dB with no regulation. 

The Exam Itself

You’re able to choose the order of things for the day. I strongly suggest that you arrange your pieces and other tests in ascending order of difficulty. This approach ensures that you’re probabilistically moving your mistakes to later in your programme. If you perform your most challenging thing first to get it out of the way – and make a catastrophic mistake – then you have to carry that with you through the rest of your programme.

The order I chose on the day was:

1. Word Up – with the exception of the 16th kicks this piece was very easy. Couple of simple fills and done. 
2. Old Bones Blues – easily my best piece by virtue of being the first thing I learned in studying for this grade – so it got the most time. 
3. Play That Funky Music – this was significantly more difficult than the other two pieces and took a lot of work to get the transitions right. I learned a lot of fundamentals while doing the practise for this piece. 
4. Technical Work
5. Sight Reading
6. Ear Tests
7. GMQ (I put this last as I didn’t want to ask one random technical question before the pieces and the rest after)

Backing Track Options

You’re free to choose:

1. Backing track only
2. Backing track + click track
3. Backing track + click track + vocals (if there are any) 

There is no penalty for any of these options. The examiner was surprised I chose the latter option as he said that teachers almost universally forbid their students from playing with vocals. My own teacher found this surprising. 

This strikes me as really odd as there is more information by having vocals and you can free up a bit of brain time from not needing to count if you know the next fill is signposted by a particular vocal phrase. I used that in a couple of places in Play That Funking Music. 

I recommend using option 3.

Getting a Distinction in a Nutshell

If you want to boil it right down to basics, getting a great result in your exam comes down to two things:

1. Quality of your audio: Have you listened to the original reference recordings? Have you listened to yourself and compared them objectively? Practise is the obvious answer here but also you need to listen to yourself and be brutally honest in assessing where your strengths and weaknesses are and applying practise time to the weaknesses.
2. Confidence: Your job in an exam is to conduct a performance. You’re sharing a piece of music for the enjoyment of someone else (and in this case he or she has a red pen and is assessing you). You must be able to quickly and confidently answer questions and conduct your playing convincingly. No one expects zero mistakes but if you can quickly deal with any mishaps confidently without losing the pulse they’ll be forgotten by the examiner. 

Adult learners have executive planning skills far in excess of any child sitting these earlier grades. You can use these capabilities to honestly assess yourself and take meaningful corrective action.  

Finally, if you can enter the exam room and honestly reflect and say that you have done all you can to prepare, then that will give you the confidence you need to get a solid grade.