Harpal Mudhar has won the Young Drummer of the Year 2007 finals. The British competition for drum talents, organised by mikedolbear.com, contained much variety and set high standards despite the young ages of the contestants.
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Contestants Joshua Law, Scott Chapman, Dexter Hercules, Bo Morgan, Ben Williams, Cornel Hrisca-Munn, James Macrae, George Barnett, Segun Akinola, Richard Rayner, Harpal Mudhar, and Grant Kershaw had been selected as the twelve 2007 finalists.
Jury Chairing the jury panel was Ade Holbrook – a music industry agent who has supported the drum event since it started in 2002. Holbrook was joined on the panel by Robin Guy (Bruce Dickinson, Rachel Stamp), Bob Henrit (Unit 4+2, Adam Faith, Argent and The Kinks), Dan Foord (Sikth), Adam Bushell (Head of Drumming at Brighton Institute of Music), Matt Helders (Arctic Monkeys), Karl Brazil (Body Rockers, Lulu, Elton John, James Blunt), Ralph Salmins (Session great, Robbie Williams, Van Morrison, etc) and Darrin Mooney (Primal Scream).
Format of the finals The format of the contest was the same as in previous five years. Each of the twelve contestants had to open with a solo before playing two pieces with session players (guitar and bass). The first ensemble piece was a piece of driving rock given to the finalists four weeks before the final. They heard the second piece, a dreaded “shuffle”, for the first time on the morning of the final. Plus each finalist was then interviewed alone by the judges.
You can read the entire review of the 2007 finals at mikedolbear.com.
Entries for the 2008 finals open on September 1, 2007 and close on November 1, 2007. Visit www.youngdrummeroftheyear.com for more information.