Lesson 1 – Part 2

Making a Kick Drum Sound

In this session you will learn how to force a bilabial plosive to make a kick drum sound.

What is a kick drum?

A kick drum is a large floor-standing drum that is hit with a beater attached to a foot pedal. It produces a low frequency (bass) drum sound.

This is the symbol used for a kick drum:

In Beatboxing there are lots of different kick drum sounds made in different ways.

In beat patterns, the kick drum symbol is square to show it can be clicked on. Click on the kick drum symbol below. You will hear the sound four times.

Did you recognise the sound? The kick drum was using the bilabial plosive sound you learned in Lesson 1.

Forcing a Sound

The kick drum using the bilabial plosive is not very loud. To make beatboxing sounds louder and punchier, beatboxers do something called forcing the sound.

When beatboxers force a plosive, extra air pressure is built up as the sound is stopped, and when the air is released it is squeezed out over a very short period of time. This creates a mini-oscillation (vibration).

The following video shows several beatboxing sounds being gradually forced:

The Forced Effector

An effector is an iconophonic that shows how a sound is shaped. To show that a sound is forced we add the forced effector.

The iconophonic is shaped like a sharp zigzag to show that the sound will create a mini-oscillation (vibration).

The forced effector does not make any sound on its own. It is only added to other sounds to show they are forced.

The Classic Kick Drum

The Classic Kick Drum is made by combining a bilabial plosive with the forced effector.

When we do this our forced bilabial plosive sounds like this:

Watch this video to learn how to make the Classic Kick Drum sound:

In beat patterns, the classic kick drum can also be represented using the kick drum symbol. Click on the kick drum symbol to play the sound four times. You can click on it again to stop playing the sound.

When you are ready, click on the QUIZ button to take the Kick Drum quiz.