Today is the Ladies Rock Camp drum retreat! I was a lot less nervous about going this time so that was good. I woke up kind of late though and was rushing around the house. When I was finally ready to go Andrew was going to go for a run so he walked me to the end of the street. He’s so sweet!

I went in and saw several people that I recognized from last year. Only one besides me had been a drummer at that camp. Apparently the drum positions fill up fast which is why they decided to have an all drum camp this time. There were so many incredible drummers there as instructors. From the email we were sent:

Shanna Doolittle
Shanna is the LRC Drum Retreat Program Director and assembly leader. Shanna drummed in The Haggard and currently drums in STLS. She has been involved with Rock Camp for Girls for just about forever.

JJ Jones
JJ combines a classic rock background with singer/songwriter, indie, and Americana music. She has performed with Lucy Wainwright Roche, Melissa Ferrick, and many more.

Caley Murray
Caley is a killer drummer. She is super involved in all things­ Rock Camp. She plays in a Heart cover band called Heart On. Whoa.

Katherine Paul
Katherine is a shredder. She plays drums in Genders.

Teri Quagliano
Teri IS drums. She plays in Lather, Rinse and Repeat.

Lisa Schonberg
Lisa is the unstoppable force behind Secret Drum Band and HITS. She played in Explode into Colors. She is possibly the most well­ known and kick­ ass drum instructors in Portland. She helped found Tom Tom Magazine, a publication dedicated to showcasing female drummers.

Heather Treadway
Heather is a polyrhythm mastermind. She shreds on congas. She played in Explode into Colors and currently plays in HITS.

Elizabeth Venable
Elizabeth plays drums in Sad Horse. Picture a combination of Taz, Keith Moon, and Animal from the Muppets, then multiply that by a million.

There were also guest musicians that were there to play with us. I was pretty happy to see Nsayi Matingou, who is an incredible drummer, there with a bass guitar.

We all started with breakfast and then Shanna went over how things were going to go.  There were 29 campers so we split into two groups. One group went off to have lessons with the various instructors while the rest of us stayed with Shanna and Lisa in an equipment workshop. We learned how to properly set up a kit, how to change a drum head (you can and should stand on a new one to get it settled), and how to tune a drum. It was very informative!

We then switched and went with different instructors for lessons. Elizabeth was with my group. She’s wonderful! She was my instructor last year. We learned some fills and some new beats and then it was lunch time. I walked down to New Seasons although I should have just gone home for food. Oh well. When we came back it was time to jam wherever we wanted to jam. I ended up in Nsayi’s room with two other drummers and it was amazing! I was pretty nervous at first but once I got into it I just played and tried different stuff here and there. It felt good to experiment. I rotated to a different room and it wasn’t as good but not horrible. I couldn’t really feel what the bass player was doing so I went down to the basement or drumgeon as we like to call it and ended up in a room with the guitar player from my band last year, Stacy and another woman I just met, Cameron. Lisa came into our room and helped us learn a surf beat and fill. It was SO much fun!

It was time for the day to end but it felt like it just flew by. This was so different from my experience last year. I had never played the drums before and we were new to Portland so I knew nobody at camp. I remember being so incredibly stressed out. I was trying to figure out how to get out of returning but each band had one drummer and there were seven bands. If I quit I would kind of screw my band so I sucked it up and went back the next day and it was amazing what a good nights sleep did. I felt so much better the next day and I played better too. By the time our showcase rolled around on Sunday I wasn’t too worried at all. We played on stage at Mississippi Studios in front of cameras and a live, paying audience but the lights were so bright I couldn’t see anyone. It was a ton of fun! It was one of those life changing things too. I did something I really didn’t think I could or would ever do.

Anyway, Andrew showed up to walk me home because he’s just too wonderful. I told him what a great day I had the entire way home. When we got there, Alice and Wayne were making dinner. Glenn was over as well. We were having a wonderful stir fry and then were going to watch Maleficent. Andrew started a fire, we had dinner and while Andrew was making popcorn I changed into comfy clothes. Jason ran home for some ice cream and brought back these awesome bags Alice has. You heat them in the microwave and they are warm and wonderful. We all got cozy on the couch and stuffed ourselves with popcorn while we watched the movie. I really enjoyed it!

Today I learned that it isn’t so scary to just try something different on the drums. Messing up isn’t the end of the world.