Just Beat It!
Drumming Up Advantages

by Karen Finucan Clarkson

Looking to boost your child's IQ? Improve attention? Provide exercise? Then buy a drum!

"Drumming engages the mind, body and soul, and benefits each," says Kristen Arant, founding director of the Young Women's Drumming Empowerment Project in Washington, D.C. "Not only does it increase the ability to focus, but drumming improves self-esteem, produces anti-cancer cells and promotes joyful relaxation."

Recent studies have shown a direct correlation between drumming and IQ - a difference of roughly seven points between those who drum and those who don't. "Learning a percussion instrument promotes academic discipline," says Marshall Maley, president of the VA/DC chapter of the Percussion Arts Society and owner of Maley's McLean Music. "Learning to play and practicing every day as part of their daily routine helps kids budget time, set and achieve goals and improve their self-image."

Get the Rhythm

Basic rhythmic drumming can be taught to those as young as two or three. In my lunch bunch class for 4- and 5-year-olds at Glenbrook Cooperative Nursery School in Bethesda, the floor is our drum. We begin the school year with basic patterns, keeping the beat with our hands to simple, recognizable melodies. Students have little difficulty tapping 1, 2, 1, 2 or a straight 4 count. Generally, we wait several weeks before introducing a three count, such as that found in a waltz, because it can be more difficult for some preschoolers.

Once basic tapping has been mastered, we add rhythm sticks to the mix. These wooden sticks can be scraped, tapped or pounded. Initially, we use them much like drum sticks, tapping them simultaneously to the music. Eventually we move toward using them in a sequence. For example, with a four count, we might tap left, right, right, right, repeating the sequence over and over as the music plays.

A wonderful resource for parents and educators looking to introduce basic drumming skills is 101 Rhythm Instrument Activities for Young Children by Abigail Flesch Connors. The book also suggests introducing a variety of other percussive instruments, such as bells and sand blocks, to preschoolers.

Most children are in fourth or fifth grade before they consider taking up the drums. "What a lot of kids don't realize is that drums are just one of a larger group of instruments that we categorize as percussion," says Maley.

Percussion Discussion

"Most of us hold the view that anything you strike for the purpose of expressing yourself musically is a percussionist instrument," says Tony Ames, principal percussion with the National Symphony Orchestra. Whether struck, shaken or rubbed, percussion instruments are second only to the human voice in the history of musical expression.

Man has been beating on drums since as far back as 6,000 BC. Mesopotamian ruins contain small cylindrical drums that are as old as 3,000 BC. "Not only are drums one of the oldest instruments, but they cross every cultural boundary and are essential to many cultures," says Ames. "They have been used for ceremonial, sacred and military purposes, as well as to communicate."

"There is something primal and real about a drum," says Kathryn Chase Bryer, associate artistic director at Imagination Stage in Bethesda. "It's so visceral. You can't help but feel it; everyone in the room feels it. It brings people together in ways other instruments cannot."

In Imagination Stage's current production of The Jungle Book, Bryer, the director, relies on drums to add color and continuity to the story of Mowgli. "The drum calls to the audience in a physical way," says Bryer. "This show has a lot of audience participation, which can be unpredictable," she says. "The second time we performed, the kids just loved the drum. Every time the drummer drummed, they all started clapping in rhythm. The drum spoke to them and they responded in a really active way."

"There's an incredible feeling that you get from creating rhythm and drumming," says Arant. In working with teenage girls, she has discovered that drumming "gives them a voice, allows them to experience success and instills a sense of camaraderie from being part of a larger group."

Playing the drum forces the brain to use both hemispheres, say researchers, something few other activities accomplish. "Drumming helps connect the two halves - the artistic and the analytic," says Arant. It helps improve coordination and rhythm and is believed to synchronize brain waves with the frequency of the earth, thereby promoting relaxation and, possibly, healing.

Music, Math & Science

While percussionists are considered artists, many excel at math and science. "There are so many mathematical concepts found in music," says Yvonne Caruthers, a National Symphony Orchestra cellist who has created a series of programs that directly relate music to classroom learning.

In Connections: MORE Math and Music - January 6, 2008 at the Kennedy Center - Caruthers brings the math curriculum to life by demonstrating the relevancy of fractions and ratios to music making. "We'll also do a lot with patterns," she says, "particularly rhythmic. An example we'll use is Ravel's Bolero. There are two measures of snare drum rhythm that are repeated throughout. Most people don't realize it, but it is one of the underlying structures of the piece."

Targeted to ages 9 through 13, Connections: MORE Math and Music, is one of a series of concerts Caruthers has developed to explore the connections between music and math, science, history and English. "No particular preparation is needed," says the cellist. "Whatever kids are doing in their math class is preparation enough. No matter what their grade, they will be dealing with fractions and ratios on some level."

"I like for students to know their fractions before beginning lessons," says Maley. "The way music is annotated - eighth notes, quarter notes, halves and whole notes - makes it easier for students to grasp the concept of reading notes if they get fractions." He adds, "It's interesting how many musicians, after they get out of college, work with computers or other number-related types of jobs."

Pounding It Out

While many people initially don't see the link, Ames suggests piano lessons for future drummers. "It is a fundamental instrument and invaluable for percussionists. It is astounding how quickly skills from the piano translate to percussion instruments such as the marimba or xylophone."

Mallet instruments, which also include the glockenspiel, are just one category of percussion. They tend to follow the piano format of white and black keys, notes Ames. "It is the mapping that occurs early on in the brain of those who play the piano that allows them to easily identify the arrangement of notes," he says.

Other percussion instruments include membranophones, such as drums and tambourines, where a skin is draped across an object, and ideophones, such as cymbals, triangles or maracas, where a hard object is struck or shaken. Both categories of percussion have instruments that are of definite or indefinite (can be tuned) pitch.

Sometimes as early as elementary school, but usually by middle school, drummers in band or orchestra will be called upon to play other percussion instruments, according to Maley and Ames. These can include a timpani, castanets, chimes and bass drum. "Students need to develop an acquaintance with all of these instruments," says Ames. "For some it will be a real challenge, but it can be mastered."

Mastery comes from practice. "I usually suggest a half hour a day to start," says Maley. "For kids with shorter attention spans that might mean two or three shorter segments to get in the full 30 minutes."

While many drummers begin taking lessons sometime in late elementary school, it is never too late to start. "I was 15 when I got hooked," said Ames, who took up drumming at the suggestion of a counselor after Ames was in and out of trouble in his early teens. "I didn't expect I could make the kind of rapid progress necessary to catch up to those who had begun early. There were times it was a killer for me. When I was well into my 20s, I finally began to feel comfortable with my skill level. But I was in my early 30s before I felt I'd caught up to my peers."

The girls who enter Kristen Arant's program are between 13 and 18 with little or no drumming experience. "Young women are like sponges at this age," she says. "They really want to try something new, different, real and authentic. Drumming is all that and more."

Karen Finucan Clarkson is the mother of three boys and teaches lunch bunch at Glenbrook Cooperative Nursery School.