1978 or so, I'd been playing guitar for a little over 10 yrs. Learned mostly old style fingerpicked blues(stepdad was a big Chet Atkins fan). I wound up moving to western PA where I walked into a music shop and befriended a guy named John Grunder who taught me more in 10 lessons than I picked up in the previous 10 yrs. He's a great player and teacher and I always credit him when I'm complimented on my playing. Last I heard (30? yrs?) he was at Fender developing what would become their "Custom Shop"
Fast fwd to summer 2012. After many years of "hearing" drum parts but not playing them I started lurking on a couple drum forums and pretty much settled here soaking up everything that you guys share so freely. I wasn't sure what kind of kit I wanted but I soon noticed that a lot of members had a bunch of differen't snare drums, so what the hell? I see a Rogers COB Powertone classified from a guy an hour away named Purdie Shuffle. We exchange emails and a phone call or two and I go meet this guy, buy the drum, we hit it off OK and he sits me down for 2 hours and starts showing me things I need to learn. I'm kinda' shocked and before I leave he gives me a practice pad, some sticks and writes down everything we just went over and tells me to call him when I get through that material.
So yesterday I'm free and having been to Purdies place another 3 or 4 times, I check to see if he's available. He is and I head east for the hour drive. I arrive and after trading pleasantries he tells me to set up the practice pad. Normally He has me go over my last lesson material but this time, no. He starts running me thru everything I learned from day one. Singles, doubles, triples, paradiddles and changing where he wants the accents. I'm nervous but do ok and realize I'm not spending enough time on the "easier" things.
After an hour of this we stop, I'm relieved and we go downstairs where a kit is set up. John sits down and starts playing nice and smooth and easy and explains and shows me at the same time how all these different things are relevant and relate to each other and depending how and where you apply them, that any number of musical styles are possible.
At this point in time I don't call myself a drummer but what he showed and explained to me finally sunk in. I watched and listened for 15-20 minutes while he used the same tools to go from playing some rock n' roll moving to a jazz groove to a waltz, some blues and some funky as hell New Orleans type thing that was nuts! It was just amazing to me to finally see how all of these things can be woven together to create different styles of music!
Anyway, I didn't mean to go on for so long but did want to say many thanks to all the members who are so generous with their knowledge and to Purdie Shuffle who luckily for me is as good an instructor as he is a player. I've been around long enough to know that with so many different personalities involved, no forum is going to be all group hugs and puppies but as far as musical instrument forums go, the VDF is easily one of the best and I'm glad to be a part of it.
