At every stage of learning; in every part of a Rockschool syllabus; broadening a students’ musical vocabulary is at the heart of what we do. We believe it’s beneficial to see each section of the exam – whether it’s in the performance, the technical exercises, sight reading, improvisation, ear tests or General Musicianship Questions (GMQ’s) – not as isolated, unrelated events; but as a collection of chapters that belong to a whole story.
A great first step to becoming a well-rounded musician is understanding the different “dialects” and “vocabulary” of musical language. Here are a few that we thought might be helpful:
- Rudiments
- Drum Rudiments are basically sticking patterns that can be used to build every drum beat, pattern, fill, and solo you can imagine.These are cleverly incorporated into the Rockschool Drums syllabus as the “Technical Exercises” – Single strokes, buzz rolls, paradiddles, double strokes, flams, drags, these are all examples of rudiments.
The next time you play your pieces, try to see what rudiments you are actually using to play your grooves and fills, you might be surprised at how many you are already doing on a regular basis!
You can find lots of sources online for rudiment charts and video tutorials, along with Rockschool’s Technical Exercises at each grade. Here’s our pick to start out from Vic Firth.
- Drum or Cymbal Makes
- The word “makes” refers to the manufacturer names, or “Brands” as we like to call them here. Some notable Drum Brands you may know are Pearl, Ludwig, Mapex, DW, and many more.
For cymbals, Sabian, Zildjian, Istanbul, Paiste, and Meinl are just a few of the options available.
- Note value terms (EU/US)
- There are different terms for the same musical note values depending on where you learned music. The most prevalent systems are those used in the UK/Aus/NZ, and the American terminologies. Both are used and accepted by RSL, however in the exams, often the US terms may be used when referring to note values:
| UK/AUS/NZ | US | Time Value |
| Semibreve | Whole note | 4 beats |
| Minim | Half note | 2 beats |
| Crotchet | Quarter note | 1 beat |
| Quaver | Eighth note | ½ beat |
| Semiquaver | Sixteenth note | ¼ beat |
- “Construction” of a major/minor chord
- There are a few ways you can approach the answer to this kind of question, but what it basically means is how is a major (or any other type of) chord composed.
You could go by the chord spelling (1-3-5 for major, 1-flat 3-5 for minor, etc.), you could name the notes in the chord if the examiner asks for a specific one like C Major would be C-E-G, or you could give the intervals between the notes in the chord (major 3rd + minor 3rd = major chord; minor 3rd + major 3rd = minor chord)
- Drum Voices
- These refer to the different sounds produced by (a.k.a. The different parts of) the drum kit, namely Kick Drum, Snare Drum, Tom 1/High Tom, Tom 2/Mid Tom, Tom 3/Low Tom/Floor Tom, crash cymbal, ride cymbal, hi-hat, etc.
These are just a few points we hope candidates and teachers will find useful. In addition, we have gathered a few GMQ Sample resources to help you get a better idea of this section of the RSL Exams!
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