Drum Lessons & Courses
Introducing my brand new Beginners Drum Course..
Kickstart Your Drumming: The Ultimate Beginners Drum Course!
Available exclusively on my Patreon page, you can purchase the entire course, or gain full access to the course via a monthly subscription. The course contains over 3.5 hours of videos, content, tutorials, quizzes and downloadable material. You can also support me on Patreon just by becoming a free member!
Aimed at complete beginner drummers, anyone that's never picked up a pair of drumsticks, or as a resource for intermediate to advanced players. I will guide you through every aspect of becoming a drummer and learning the drums inside out.
Beginning with getting to know the drum set, we will learn how to hold the sticks properly, setup your drums in the most efficient way possible, reading and understanding music theory and drum music, foot techniques, note value exercises, drum grooves, drum fills, using the ride and crash, playing along to music and much more secret nuggets of knowledge!
The course is split up into short digestible sections, giving the student time and space to learn each lesson throughly before moving on. I strongly suggest not moving through the lessons too quickly, and practising the ideas taught until you fully understand and feel comfortable with the topic and exercises.
There will also be included a fully downloadable pdf of my book "Beats, Fills & Skills by Thomas Frederick Mills" which all the course material is based upon. This means the student is able to read and practise the exercises away from the course videos once they have watched them, in their own time and provides a great resource for getting even more out of the course!
There will also be the application of playing drums along to music included in the course, taking your favourite songs with the drum grooves learnt and starting to learn to play in a musical setting with other instruments, because hey that's the goal eventually right!
By the end of this course you will not only have played, understood and encountered every part of the drum set, but you will feel and play this in a confident way knowing how and where to improve and begin your journey as an amazing drummer!
Drum Lessons
My main goal during drum lessons is to make sure my students are relaxed and comfortable in a creative environment, so that learning the drums is what it should be; fun, enjoyable and rewarding.
I use a wide range of professional drumming experience and teaching resources to create an individual path of learning that is specialised to you, enabling you to achieve your own specific goals within the drum lessons and beyond. These resources are from a broad range of internationally recognised educational books, syllabuses, techniques, programs, grades and drum educators. Also, for those that aren’t driven by a particularly aim in mind I provide all the grounding and teaching expertise to help them grow and learn as a drummer and a musician.
Whether you are starting out with the drums looking for beginner drum lessons, simply want some fun thrashing about on a real acoustic drum kit (there is nothing like the thrill of banging the drums!), or whether you want to hone in a particular skill, I’m confident that I can tailor my drum lessons to suit your needs.
My drum lessons draw from my extensive experience as a professional recording, touring and working session drummer in the music industry, having travelled all over the world playing drums, and studying drums. My lessons can focus on gaining a solid technique, understanding the drums, groove playing, song based learning, becoming a working drummer and achieving your individual drumming based goals.
“Thom was a drum student of mine from throughout his years on the Higher Diploma and BA(Hons) course at BIMM. Throughout this time I found him to be an excellent student, both in terms of his attendance and punctuality, but also his work ethic to improve his drumming ability. The recent performances I’ve seen have proved to me the hard work has paid off – he’s playing great!”
Adam Bushell (Head of Drums at BIMM, now CEO & Drum Tutor at Water Bear music college)
Teaching Experience
I studied at BIMM (Brighton Institute of Modern Music) and received a 2:1 degree in professional musicianship, drums in 2006. I was taught by Adam Bushell, (Sheryl Crowe, Faithless, Rhythm magazine tutor), Russell Gilbrook (Van Morrison, Tommi Iomy, Uriah Heep), and Vinny Lammi (Spice Girls, Mel C).
I have also since continued my drum studying with Dave Elitch (The Mars Volta, Miley Cyrus, Justin Timberlake, The 1975) a phenomenal player, and even greater drum teacher. I recognise that as soon as you think there is no room for improvement on your instrument you have become stale, there is always more to learn.
After I left music college I set up my own private drum lesson teaching business whilst gaining experience teaching at primary (Ashdown Primary School, Shoreham Beach Primary) and secondary schools (The Littlehampton Academy) and also at SAM (Sussex Academy of Music).
I have experience teaching all ages and abilities and have taught children from age 5 to adults over 70. This informs how I tailor my lessons, and so I always make sure the student’s direct specific needs are addressed and taken into account in every drum lesson. Past students include Alfie Sayers (HotWax) & Camille Phillips (The Subways).
Running alongside this I have been working as a professional, touring, session and recording drummer, whilst also supplying weekly drum lessons online through my youtube channel which has over 7k subscribers.
The 4 Lesson Options
1 On 1 Drum Lessons
These take place on acoustic drums at my home drum recording studio ‘RedDrum Recording Studio’ located in Portslade, Brighton. This is my preferred method of teaching as attention can be made to all aspects of your playing in person, and help you to improve in the most effective way.
Online Drum Course
I now have a full drum course aimed at beginners exclusively over on my patreon page, includes over 3.5 hours of lessons, videos, tutorials and written materials, take a closer look here: patreon.com/ThomMillsDrums
Online Video Drum Lessons
Via Zoom, Skype or FaceTime, these online video style drum lessons make it possible to receive and improve your drumming from anywhere in the world.
YouTube Drum Lessons
Each week (Sunday midday) I release a drum lesson, drum cover or other related drumming material, this can be accessed over at my YouTube Channel and for completely free! Enabling you to learn at home, anytime and at your own pace.
