Dad Blogs - Dad Blogs | Kids & Music: Jonah Rocks

Thursday, 14 January 2010 16:24

Written by pjmullen

(1 vote, average 5.00 out of 5)

Searching for some inspiration for column ideas I stumbled upon one unexpectedly while reading Mashable the other day. Their post about Jonah Rocks, a five year old drumming prodigy, blew me away.

My opinion on kid's music has been well documented, but kid's making kick ass music? Sign me up!

After watching Jonah cover the percussion on 'Toxicity' by System of a Down I became consumed, watching nearly all of the videos of him performing on YouTube. Among my favorites were his covers of 'Tom Sawyer' and 'Harvester of Sorrow'.

Edit: There was a video here, but since the Mashable coverage (it seems), embedding has been disabled.

And as if his chops weren't impressive enough, Jonah already has artist profiles on Vic Firth's and Zildjian's website. Here's his bio from his website's 'about me' page:

“Way back in 2008, at the age of 3, Jonah Rocks was lining up his Play-Doh cans to make a drum kit. He would sneak all the baby spoons from the cupboard, and use them as drumsticks. His daddy asked him if he wanted a real drum kit, and of course, Jonah said ‘YES!’ Once he sat down behind that kit, and held that first pair of 7A’s in his hands, he has never put them down, playing as much as he can, whenever he can. Jonah is completely self taught, never had a lesson, and if you’ve watched him play, you know he absolutely loves it.”

Regardless of whether you like the types of music he performs or not, you have to admit that what he has accomplished with no lessons at the tender age of five is quite impressive.

Personally, I think we need more of this on TV and less of this:

Take THAT Your Baby Can Read!

Now excuse me while I go duct tape some drum sticks to my son's hands.

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written by Juan Nieto, January 19, 2010

regarding Jonah Rocks, I had been watching his videos for some time,I went to you tube in curiosity,what that site was about,which seemed silly to me (plus I was depressed at that time),but there was this little guy ,in the tuesday special ,musical section, I believe ,and just gave it a shot,the video cover was The Who's "wont get fooled again" and I was with my jaw on the floor,and not only that, the rawness, and his smile of complete joy,he is a natural talent,then I started to see his other videos,and I became a jonaholic, hic!! ,but there is also a situation, where people from other parts of the world ,had copied his videos,and are placing them back in you tube as theirs,so Jonah's Dad, has been battle in out with this people to stop,which in turn has affected all of his sites in you tube,myspace,twitter,and own site to be down, don't know how long,I'm sure he is very upset and hurt by this people,if you ever read comments,there had and is very supportive of him, with praises but not without the haters ,the world is watching,but that kid brings out of me tears of joy.

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written by Juan Nieto, January 19, 2010

sorry for the Infantile sound of my wording,I wanted to compress my thoughts here as possible, yet I have this love and admiration for this baby,that brings out the child in me,If you had seen more of his videos of his,you will see what I mean,he is from Canada,so that could be the environment of his musical choices,(in this hip hop generation)I'm glad he has the recognition of people like you ,and I'm all for it ,that picture of you with your baby,speaks millions for you,big ups!!!

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written by ciara, January 20, 2010

it's no wonder comments are disabled and there are statements about copyrights on the site/videos if what juan is saying is true. this kid is awesome. i GOTTA show my 12 yo dd. this is her 2nd year playing drums/percussion in school and only started playing a whole set this year. plus, i think she's gonna fall in love w him cos he obviously loves SOAD which is one of her faves. :0) i love how he says, 'turn the camera on' hehe so cute!