Recreating Blinding Lights by ear
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Lesson details
Learning outcome
I can recreate a drum part and hook by ear.
Key learning points
- Drum beats can be recreated by ear by using similar techniques to working out a melodic line.
- Breaking it into small chunks and trying to pick out individual instruments or lines helps.
- Blinding Lights has a typical pop drum groove, with a snare backbeat, repeated hi-hats and kick emphasising 1 and 3.
- The hook uses a synth lead and has syncopated rhythms.
Keywords
Hook - a short, memorable musical idea that recurs in a pop song; it is designed to ‘catch’ the ear of the listener
Synth lead - a type of synthesiser that is well suited to playing melodic lines
Syncopated - a rhythm that emphasises notes in between the main beats
Common misconception
All drum grooves have exactly the same rhythms in the kick, snare and hi-hat.
Many typical drum grooves do have the same features or features very close to this, however encourage pupils to identify where there are subtle differences and how the kick, snare and hi-hat patterns can be varied within these features.
Teacher tip
When working out the hook, encourage students to sing notes and parts of the hook to themselves, working out each note individually and thinking about the overall shape. This hook has some leaps in it, and uses a mixture of white and black notes, so ensure that students consider those aspects.
Equipment
DAW, MIDI keyboards
Licence
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