This Advises Mike Portnoy For Young Drumers

Mike Portnoy (Instagram @mikeportnoy)

JAKARTA - In an interview with Chile's Radio Futuro, former Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy was asked about the advice he would give potential musicians who wanted to follow in his footsteps.

"You can see on Instagram or YouTube, there are all the young drummers and I mean they are young; I see a six-year-old girl playing my drum fillings on Instagram or whatever. So it's amazing that bars have grown so high with these young musicians and drummers, and they are all so talented," Portnoy said.

What will I give you? Try to learn as much from as possible from as many people, but also play with other musicians," he continued.

"It's amazing to see these young people playing all my crazy and technical drums, it's obviously very impressive technically, but playing drums is more than just playing this part," explains Portnoy.

"So, play with other musicians. Write your own music. It's not just about playing your instruments to Instagram followers; it's about playing with other musicians and creating music. And it's about how you use instruments in a bigger image context and the music you write. So that's my advice."

Portnoy, who co-founded Dream Theater more than 37 years ago, suddenly left the band in September 2010 on a tour withranged Sevenfold. Since then, he has been replaced by Mike Mangini (Annihilator, Extreme, James LaBrie, and Steve Vai.