This week’s featured drummer is a new-age drummer that any aspiring musician in general should take notes from. He is the greatest example of what a musician should aim to accomplish in order to achieve proper success regarding the social media trends of today. Consistent activity is more crucial than anything when it comes to marketing yourself, and no one I know is better at it than this drummer. He is also absolutely unreal in regards to technical skill, demonstrating flawless control and blazing-fast chops. This drummer is no other than…
El Estepario Siberiano – Drummer for Saratoga, Independent (content creator)
Taken from https://drumfaster.com/drummers/content-creators/el-estepario-siberiano-drummer/
As stated above, anyone that is trying to increase their brand awareness and grow on social media need to take notes from Estepario. This man posts at least two covers a week on YouTube, and nearly daily on Instagram. None of this content is rushed or low-effort either; everything he does has fun editing to make the experience more enjoyable for the viewer. On top of this, it is obvious that he spends many hours a day practicing to hone his already proficient skills even further. For the speed that he plays at, he is definitely one of the most relaxed drummers I have come across. For demonstration, let’s take a look at one of his many covers. Here is “Toxicity” by System of a Down:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KG7uso1JH8
This is a decent example of one of his “overplayed showmanship” covers. Do not take that out of context, however; I only have positive connotations behind that statement. He still stays absolutely true to the beats of the song, but basically doubles the speed of the fills with insanely clean and controlled rudimental chops. He also does his classic linear pattern between floor tom and bass drum around the 2:41 mark to emulate double bass, as he typically prefers not to use one. He also keeps his setup quite minimal with only two toms and (in this particular cover) just four overhead cymbals and a hi-hat. A simple set-up is a double-edged sword; where it lacks multiple sounds, it does allow the player to think more creatively about how they can manipulate what is in front of them. As seen in this cover, Estepario’s chops are more than enough to make do with this setup. For some perspective, the majority of this song is 120~bpm; therefore, Estepario is effortless and accurately playing rudimentary chop fills around 240bpm, a speed that a number of death metal drummers do not even do for blasts. Moving on, let’s amp things up a bit; here is a video of Estepario playing “GAIA” by Chris Coleman, a song that he considers to be the hardest he has ever played:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12wir9U722s
First of all, I would like to point out that his setup is very similar to the Toxicity cover; however he has replaced the rack tom with a cowbell. Many drummers abuse the use of toms to create fills, but Estepario gets creative with his chops and rudiments whilst incorporating any cymbals that he can to keep things interesting. After watching this video back numerous times, I am still learning many different things from his playing that have benefitted me. The whole section beginning around the 3:15 is basically a massive chops fill at blinding speed that lasts until the 3:49 mark. That is essentially a 34 second fill at a very high speed; this is only achievable with the kind of relaxed technique that Estepario has developed from hours of practice. Despite how far he decides to take this song, he seemingly never misses a beat whilst adding so much to it. It is videos like this that land a musician promotional jobs to create a living out of their craft.
In summation, El Estapario Siberiano embodies the kind of hard-working mentality that anyone in a creative industry should strive to achieve and maintain. It is crucial in this day and age to keep an active persona online that displays your abilities and outgoing personality to potential employers and sponsorships that may be enticed by it. Along with staying very active on socials, he has started a Patreon-based Drum Academy to pass his knowledge onto those who want to learn as well as fitness tips and personal training. He also does several promotional gigs for companies that hire him behind the scenes, and has recently taken over as the drummer for Spanish power metal band Saratoga. Alongside all of this, he keeps up with regular practice routines to continue to improve his craft. He is a very busy and hard-working man that all of us can learn from. To conclude, here is a video he has made discussing how much he makes off social medias, and what he does to maintain a living as a musician. It is a very eye-opening video that reiterates the points I just stated above, but in his own humble and honest manner. Thank you for reading, and enjoy!
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