You would think that once Mikeslessons.com was established one would be happy and just ride the wave of online lessons. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how successful and how popular the site has become. With thousands of subscribers all over the world, several drum camps every year, I think the average Joe would stop at that, enjoy reaping the rewards of all the work put into the business. Not Mike, he always seems to be pushing the limits and finding new and better ways to teach, educate and communicate.
Enter Groove Freedom. As Mike puts it in his a quote below, it was inspired by books that he used and was influenced by, the concept may not be new but the presentation was more modern and current. I've always felt that limb independence was true freedom on the kit, the ability to play anything limb by limb at will was always my personal goal from the beginning but getting there was the hard part. This concept can be applied to the left hand, bass drum and the possibilities with various grooves and combinations are endless. In the Groove Freedom Book there are various exercises for all levels of drummers from basic rock beat grooves to the more advanced world groove exercises.
"I actually wrote this book for myself after realizing how limited I was in certain grooves, or in other words how little "freedom" I had. Playing a groove is one thing, but having absolute freedom inside that groove, well that's a different thing all together, and it's something that I want for myself and for all of you. I realized that this was a huge weak link in my drumming armor and it needed to be fixed. I decided to adapt ideas from books that I grew up with like Future Sounds and The New Breed as well as modern books like The Language Of Drumming to help me overcome my lack of true freedom with all of my grooves."
Mike Johnston
Now I did say on the previous page about how Mike is driven by innovation and he proves it yet again by developing the Groove Freedom App. If you are anything like me, having audio and visual aid I find is more effective for the learning process. Reaching next level status, this app gives you the ability to work limb by limb, at any tempo, with various Gretsch drum kit sounds, built in metronome, a section called Heat Check to test your new abilities and many more features. All I can say is be ready to make some major drum faces as this concept reveals your weaknesses in areas you thought you had a handle on. It's quite humbling but it will only make you a more solid and well rounded drummer.
