Neil Peart. “Pieces Of Eight.” Rush. Full Percussion Transcription Score by Ben Grauer.

The FIRST full percussion transcription of Neil Peart’s, “Pieces Of Eight” from his 1987 Modern Drummer Sound Supplement record, which I transcribed by ear and pencil, then finalized using Sibelius. Commentary follows the song about my approach.

NEIL E. PEART (1952 - 2020.) -"Rest in peace, Neil. You will be sorely missed!"

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NEIL’S PRINTED ARTICLE: (Originally appeared in the May ’87 issue of Modern Drummer Magazine.)

Like many percussionists, I had long harbored a secret wish to create a piece of music using only percussion instruments. The key to that dream was my discovering the KAT keyboard percussion synthesizer. I practiced with the KAT for a few days and then, when I had a free day, recorded a “demo” of a marimba piece I had been working on over the summer.

I began with the marimba part, double-tracked it, and then overdubbed my acoustic drums on top. I began experimenting with overdubbing different vibe songs, a bass marimba, a cabasa, castanets, concert toms, metal sheets, African toms and some highly tuned bongos. (All of this was played with mallets on the KAT unit.) I did use one of Geddy’s keyboard sounds, but since it consisted of a marimba with a human voice mixed in I decided that was close enough!

The biggest difficulty was finding a good bass instrument in the percussion library. The bass marimba didn’t provide the power in the bottom end that I was looking for, so we experimented with some other things. We ended up using an African drum called a djembe - transposed to the keyboard - and I played the bass part with that. It made me laugh - a new definition of “bass drum”!

The piece is entitled “Pieces Of Eight” because of all the different time signatures it ended up meandering through. I hadn’t thought about that too much just playing the marimba, until I had to learn it on drums! With only a day to record it all, I didn’t really have time to play it more than a couple of times through, so that, too, was a good challenge.

I find it interesting as a drummer to work with a melodic instrument and think melody as well as rhythm. You can really get into some wild areas! In a way, I wish I hadn’t been so obsessed with drums alone in the beginning and had acquired more knowledge of music theory. But I suppose in this day and age you do have to specialize!

Sound Supplement Credits
Recorded and mixed at Elora Sound Studios.
Engineered by Jon Erickson.
Technical Assistance by Jim Burgess, Larry Allen, and Tony Geranios.
Copyright 1987 by Neil Peart.

2019 Audio Remastering by Joel Evenden.

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COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER:
This is an educational, not-for-profit video created under the “Fair Use” doctrine of the United States copyright act of 1976.* Except for the transcription, all rights for the music and pictures go to the respected copyright owner. NO COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT INTENDED!

*Sections 17 U.S.C. § 106 and 17 U.S.C. § 106A.

Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use.

Software used for this project: Sonar X1, Sibelius, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe AfterEffects and iMovie.

This transcription and video project Copyright 2019, Garden Wall Music.