THE ROCKIN’ FALL RECITAL 2015

I have been teaching privately out of my own drum studio for a little over ten years. It has been a truly rewarding experience and I’ve had the opportunity to teach and, in some cases, mentor a wide variety of people at different levels of musical capability. It’s been great getting to know all of them and become their friends. In all that time I never organized a student recital. That fact changed last Sunday afternoon, at Chalet Studios in Pickering Ontario, when eleven of my current drum students found themselves performing and recording tracks with professional musicians.<a href=”http://aubreydayle.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Bryce-winner-pic.jpg”><img class=”size-medium wp-image-1355″ src=”http://aubreydayle.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Bryce-winner-pic-300×200.jpg” alt=”Bryce Thurton and his new 400 series Sonor bass drum pedal” width=”300″ height=”200″ /></a> Bryce Thurton and his new 400 series Sonor bass drum pedalThe mother of one of my favourite young students asked me about my student recital plans approximately three years ago. She was accustomed to attending her daughter’s piano recitals year after year and wanted to know how I structured mine. In fact she mentioned to me that she thought it was a very important part of the process of learning to play an instrument. She is not a musician but her thinking was sound and it struck me as something I should organize for my teaching studio. I was too sick with kidney failure and I couldn’t do much about the recital at that time. I then had a transplant and spent two and a half years recovering and reasserting myself into the global music scene as a performer and an educator. I was finally able to organize the recital this year thanks to the incredible help of David Chester of Chalet Studios, the production company I work with called ‘The RADD Collective’, Scott Atkins at Sonor Canada and Coast music, as well as Craig Snowdon at Dream Cymbals. I would also like to thank the awesome back up band that included Rob Laidlaw ( Platinum Blonde, Tom Cochrane), Dale Russell ( The Guess Who), Steve ‘Skulls’ Saunders, and Dave Chester.
<a href=”http://aubreydayle.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Evan-Bradley-winner-pic.jpg”><img class=” wp-image-1350″ src=”http://aubreydayle.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Evan-Bradley-winner-pic-200×300.jpg” alt=”Evan Bradley and his new Dream crash cymbal” width=”177″ height=”266″ /></a> Evan Bradley and his new Dream crash cymbalAll eleven students are winners in my eyes just for saying yes to the prospect of performing in front of a live audience. They also did their very best in preparing for, and executing their performances. Two of my students are performing at a professional level and simply need to expand their stylistic vocabulary as well as to gain experience. Most of the others who participated have been playing the drums for a period that varies from about 4 months to a couple of years. However, I have two young students who took our breathes away last Sunday. The first of the two to play was 12 year old Evan Bradley. He played a version of “Everlong” by The Foo Fighters that Dave Grohl would have loved! I started teaching Evan when he was about 8 years old and at that time he had a hard time in the lessons due to his tendency to be a real perfectionist. Well he has gotten over all of that and his pursuit of perfection is really starting to pay off because his performance at the recital was nothing short of brilliant. 11 year old Bryce Thurton then sat behind the drum kit and absolutely floored the crowd with a rockin’ version of “Are You Gonna Go My Way”by Lenny Kravitz. Bryce is the kind of student music teachers love to teach. He practices a great deal and is always ready for his lessons. I am very proud of him and we should all look out for some great playing from him in the future. Both Evan and Bryce won prizes provided by Sonor Canada and Drum Cymbals. Their hard work has really paid off!

The fall drum recital was a great success. I’m glad that all of my students and their friends and family had a fantastic time. I believe that I was able to provide a unique experience for all of them in having the recital in a recording studio and capturing the students performances on film and a multitrack audio recording. I am already starting to think about doing a spring recital up at Chalet. I’m hearing that many of my students didn’t want the afternoon to end!