Monday-Tuesday 28th and 29th July

Rockin-Robins Drum Services announce their Summer Drum School 2025.

With Gareth Grover (Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes) and Gabi King (The 1975, Declan Mckenna, Perrie)

28th to 29th July 2025 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. (both days) at Chapel Street Arts Centre, Derby

More details and BOOKING CLOSED

Sunday June 22nd 2025

The Herts Drum Collective presents an afternoon of drum edutainment – 1 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at The Pioneer Club, St. Albans

Gareth will be joining Will Taylor (The Damned), Rob Rolfe (Enter Shikari) and Dan Foord (SikTh). Come along and hear stuff!

Full details and booking CLOSED

If you don’t do it already, playing along to music can prove to be one of the most productive forms of practice as part of a balanced regime – a useful way of learning to execute whatever ideas you’ve been drilling through but with important musical context.

Equally as useful is filming yourself to help assess what’s working and what needs work. So, here’s my attempt at this medium-fast swing chart, arranged by Laurence Cottle, recorded by Darren Williams and available among others from Ultimate Big Band, filmed at Tom Mitchener’s studio.

Big Band music has always been close to my heart right from the early days of learning the instrument. Working and playing mostly in the rock world for so many years has meant I’ve not been so active in some of these other areas of my playing, until 2020 came along and gifted me more practice time than I knew what to do with. Thanks to folk like Darren Williams (@darrenwilliamsmusic) and Laurence Cottle, there are some incredible resources available out there to help you develop these important contextual skills in your playing.

Follow the link here for more information on how to get hold of these ‘Ultimate Big Band’ charts, complete with useful tips on how to assimilate the style. If nothing else, they’re a lot of fun, but they truly are a whole lot more.

Enjoy.