The Three Cheers are commonly understood as flourishes performed before and after some major duty calls.

COMMENCING A BEAT

Based on a survey of 19th century British and American drum manuals, as well as 18th and 19th century British and American general orders, military treatises, etc., there appear to be four methods of commencing a beat:

  1. When it just the Orderly Drummer, there is no need for a signal. The drummer commences the beating on his own.
  2. When the group of drummers who will beat are all assembled in the same place, the beatings commence with a Flam. This is true when just the Guard Drummers at one location are performing (ex. Pioneer’s Call, Roast Beef, etc.). This is also true when the corps is assembled to beat a March, Quickstep, etc.
  3. For the major daily beatings – The Troop, The Retreat, The Tattoo, and The General – all the musicians are first assembled. Then, the several different groups of musicians are coordinated by the Signal Strokes and The Three Rolls or the Three Cheers. Following the rolls, the lead drummers of the different groups play the Flam before commencing the duty call.
  4. The Reveille and the Drummer’s Call begin with The Camp Taps. Similar to the Signal Strokes, the Camp Taps coordinates the drummers of the guard to commence simultaneously. These two calls appear to be the only ones performed by all the guard drummers at the same time.

To learn more, go to the next section “The Flam: To Commence All Beatings”.

Or, skip to the conclusion “Summary: Commencing a Beating”.