Find a percussion tutor for the way you want to play

Try this constructed four-beat exercise by clapping or tapping. Count 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and, with every spoken syllable equally spaced. Tap on 1, 2, the and after 2, and 4. Stay silent with your hands throughout beat 3.

If you skip the silence, the final tap arrives too early. Keep saying the full count, including 3 and, while your hands wait. The last tap should land exactly with 4, then the next repetition should begin on the next 1.

The improvement to listen for is a steady beat beneath both sound and silence. Once the pattern is secure, try it at the same speed with a quieter sound. If the timing changes, return to counting aloud before adding speed or a more complicated pattern. This is the sort of small task that lets a tutor distinguish a counting difficulty from a problem controlling the sticks.

For ensemble playing, bring the part and identify the difficult entry, rhythm or change of instrument. Practise the lead-in as well as the difficult bar: being able to start a passage in isolation does not show that you can find it after several bars of rest.

For a grade, name the board, instrument, grade and exam format, and use the current syllabus to choose pieces. As one example, Trinity’s Classical & Jazz digital grades offer these two pathways. Other boards and formats have their own requirements.

Latimer offers one-to-one tuition with an online-first approach. For percussion, discuss the practical setup before booking: what instrument you will use, where it can be played and how the tutor will see the relevant movements. Microsoft Teams is the default lesson platform; another platform can be agreed with the tutor.

A pad can give you somewhere to practise sticking and rhythm, but it cannot reproduce tuned notes, timpani tuning or a full kit’s hand-and-foot coordination. Tell the tutor about any instruments you can use at school or a rehearsal venue, and agree which tasks are realistic at home.