Colleges for Drum Set.

5. Perhaps - qualify for a scholarship to a University for their marching band program.

It's true, a high school friend of mine got a full ride at Harvard with a B+ average in High school because she was an excellent Bassoon player, and Harvard needed one!

IF you're intent on a music degree, prepare yourself with formal piano lessons, mallet work etc... there's no way around it. You will need to take theory, composition, performance (and not just on a drum kit).

IF you think you're going to North Texas to play a kit... that all comes into being after doing the pre-degree foundational course work.

There are a lot of programs now that don't require any foundational/classical percussion work. Especially Berklee, the school is almost exclusively rock/pop now, so you don't see the classical percussion as much. At NEC, the school is about 80% classical, and 20% jazz, but the jazz drums program doesn't require you to play anything but kit (and a little piano for theory/comp).

That being said, I started out with fife and drum, and classical percussion, and I think it's hugely beneficial to start there rather than jumping right into drum set...

Heck military bands are just about all made up of college grads these days.

It's true! Actually military bands are a great deal for musicians. You join as a 2nd Lt, so you make about 60K per year to just woodshed. After 4 years, you have an amazing resume, and have saved up a boat load of money!
 
Correct and correct.

Now, learning and growing as a musician is obviously important, and I highly recommend you engage in some melodic training in order to better communicate with other players. And while very prestigious in some aspects, a degree from Berklee will have no effect on your getting work. In some cases, a degree might even suggest to a potential band that you're overeducated, and will try to play all sorts of fancy stuff, instead of the meat & potatoes that 97.3% of the bands/artists need from drummers.

If you have the temperament to play 2&4, and can work with a click but also hold a tempo without it, then you're ready for the vast majority of gigs. Go out and start working.

Bermuda

I've adhered to the Bermuda School of Drumming now for most of my career. And look where it's gotten me!

I'm one happy customer!
 
It's true! Actually military bands are a great deal for musicians. You join as a 2nd Lt, so you make about 60K per year to just woodshed. After 4 years, you have an amazing resume, and have saved up a boat load of money!


It's true. The Army is auditioning right now for West Point Academy band on drumset and I personally know a drumset player in the President's Own Marine Band in Washington.

The audition requires. 4 mallet marimba solo of your choice, Bach Cello suites on marimba, cymbal, snare drum exerpts. Xylophone exerpt Porgy and Bess and much more. I personally heard the story of the audition for the guy I know in the President's Own. It was okay we want to hear that Bach, Okay stop now jump on set and play this with the quartet. Then back to marimba we want to hear Mexican Dances again.

This guy has a DMA and was a professional timpanist in a symphony before getting the drumset gig.
 
I read an article that interviewed the 1994 Juilliard graduating class (all the orchestral instrumental majors, not including piano). By 2009, half of them didn't even PLAY anymore.

For that matter, I have a 4-year performance degree, and made 1st-chair All-state band 6 times in 3 years in high school (mallets, timps, and snare). But I literally didn't play from 2000 to 2013. I'm a phone/internet installer, and I love it. Music is great, but the music business is mostly a miserable slog, unless you find a good niche. Few do. Do it for fun on the side, make a little money at it, and have a solid day job. None of my teachers in the Dallas Symphony seemed especially happy with their career choice, and the life of the typical gigging musician is pretty shitty, not even counting the low pay.
 
I'm pro education but I'm a very cautious debtor. I was a double major in college and went to grad school, but I took a period of three years off incrementally along the way in order to finish debt free.
In this day and age I would be leery of amassing a large amount of school loan debts, especially in pursuing music. All the advice you're receiving in the posts here is spot on.

For what it's worth my perspective is that no study program can make you successful. The people who are successful coming out of a study program are the ones who were already successful going into the program.

The school and program you choose to go to may open some doors, but it will very likely close a number of other doors. So if you choose to pursue a music performance degree, choose your school wisely.
For example, North Texas State University in Denton, Texas has an amazing Jazz Program. That degree--while it doesn't define you--would open doors in the jazz community, but could potentially close a number of other doors.

All the advantages you address in attending a music program are true, but they come at a very high cost. The only reason I see getting degrees in music is if you desire to teach at an undergraduate or graduate level at some point in your career.
When I attended graduate school I was amazed that two-thirds of the students there wanted to be professors.

If I were to offer you any counsel, I would say get a college degree or a skilled trade while you're young so that you have something to fall back on to support yourself if music doesn't pan out the way you hoped.
Still pursue your music passionately in and after college, but have a Plan B in place.

If this was an episode of Shark Tank, I would advise you to jump all over--like a hobo on a ham sandwich--the offer extended to you by poppies. Apprenticeship is an amazingly effective way to gain more knowledge and experience
at a fraction of the cost to achieve your overall goals, and can be the single most effective way to network and establish a solid career.

And I'll throw in one final piece of advice I never got, but wish I had: whatever your dream position is, you want to land there by your early 50's, so plan and work accordingly.
 
FWIW, from a Berklee grad: you can network with top musicians, get lessons from the world's greatest drummers, get access to practice rooms and incredible equipment, etc., on your own for about 10% of the cost of attending there. You can intern at a record label and learn everything you'd learn in Berklee's biz classes and far more. I will even personally help you plan out the details of how to do all these things if you're willing to spare yourself a pointless debt trap. Feel free to PM me.

That's absolutely awesome right there..To the OP I'd jump all over that if this is what you want to do
 
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