Blues shuffle drum beat at 120 BPM
Press Play for a blues shuffle drum beat at 120 BPM. It starts with Purdie Shuffle, and you can switch to When the Levee Breaks and Fool in the Rain Shuffle. One beat lasts 500 ms.
Playing over a blues shuffle drum beat at 120 BPM
120 BPM is at the fast end for blues shuffle. Stay relaxed: if your hands tense up or you start rushing, drop back ten BPM, play the part cleanly for a few minutes, then come back up.
What plays at 120 BPM
Purdie Shuffle is written at 126 BPM, the closest of this style's grooves to 120 BPM, so it opens first and plays a little slower than written. In 4/4 at this tempo a quarter note lasts 500 ms, an eighth note 250 ms and a sixteenth 125 ms, which is the spacing of the hi-hat you hear. Switch to When the Levee Breaks and Fool in the Rain Shuffle on the page and the tempo stays at 120 BPM.
How long is a phrase at 120 BPM?
Knowing how long a phrase lasts helps you plan a song, a solo or a recording take. The drums play a fill at the end of every four or eight bars, so these are the lengths you will hear.
| Length | Time |
|---|---|
| One bar of 4/4 | 2 seconds |
| Four-bar phrase | 8 seconds |
| Eight-bar section | 16 seconds |
| Twelve-bar blues chorus | 24 seconds |
| Three-minute song | about 90 bars |
How a blues shuffle drum beat works
A shuffle divides each beat into three and plays the first and last parts: long-short, long-short. Your part should swing the same way. If you play straight eighths over a shuffle, the band sounds like it is arguing with itself.
How to play along
Play a twelve-bar blues over it: four bars of I, two of IV, two of I, then V, IV, I, V. Guitarists can use the classic boogie shape on the lowest strings and swing every pair of notes. Count "one-and-a two-and-a" to feel the triplets.