Story by Mike Haid
Photos by Alex Solca

Australian drumming master Virgil Donati has in fact been on American soil for 10 years now, residing in Los Angeles. Donati continues to push the envelope of modern drumset techniques, and remains an in-demand worldwide clinician and recording artist. He’s also recently released an Ultimate Play-Along book/CD package (Alfred) featuring off-the-hook charts from his bands Planet X and On The Virg.

Donati still maintains a rigorous practice schedule, but because he lives in a condo, he spends most of his practice, rehearsal, and recording time in a rented lock-out rehearsal faciliy in the artsy area of Los Angeles known as North Hollywood – or NoHo, as the locals refer to it. “The studio is located in an area that is clustered with rehearsal and recording studios,” Virgil explains. “That’s proven to be an advantage for easy access to my gear when I’ve been in pre-production for tours, or in recording situations. It’s amazing how often I, or my techs, have had to make a run to my room for a pick-up. And Drum Paradise, one of the largest drum cartage companies in LA, is just a few doors up. They take care of my gear for most studio situations.”

Virgil shares the building with several well-known drumming luminaries. Will Kennedy, Thomas Lang, Abe Laboriel Jr., and John Tempesta, for instance, are recent tenants.
Virgil’s cozy 9½ by 20 air-conditioned studio has just enough room to fit his keyboard rig and large Pearl drumkit. He does however, have overhead storage along three of the four carpet-lined walls, containing his collection of snaredrums, Sabian cymbals, Remo heads, and Vater sticks. Virgil has several Pearl kits, but he’ll use the same one for several months in the studio, until he feels it’s time for an acoustic change. His current studio kit is an eight-piece Pearl BRX birch, with 6-ply shells and seafoam green finish. The setup is rack-mounted and includes a spectrum of Sabian cymbals, including Virgil’s Signature Series Saturation crashes.

Across the hall, Virgil shares another room with vocalist Mark Boals (ex-Yngwie Malmsteen, Ring Of Fire). This acts as a recording control room, with a computer, a console, monitoring equipment, and the like. When Virgil has a recording project, his practice room becomes his recording room. He simply sets up mics, runs a snake across the hall to the control room, and records his drum tracks.

Donati says he has recorded several projects this way, inclusing Bunny Brunels LA Zoo Revisited and the upcoming Planet X album. This situation works well for Virgil as well as the artist he’s recording for, as it saves on cartage fees and outside studio expenses, and provides a comfort zone for Virgil to create freely within his own private space.. Does external noice from other clients in the busy rehearsal building ever make recording difficult? “Generally it’s not a problem,” Donati insists. “The isolation is quite good, and most bands don’t comein until the evening hours, so I lean towards an early start if I’m recording in my room.”

A famous practice monster, Virgil still spends the better part of each day on the drumkit. “I try to get in four to five hours a day of practice time”, he reports. “Ut’s amazing how quickly that time passes when you use it intelligently and creatively. I need to spend quality time practicing to learn things properly and thoroughly. My hat goes off to those drummers who say that they never practice but can play amazing things. “I don’t know how they do it.”

During the four to six months of the year that Virgil spends on the road, the only time he finds to practice is backstage, or at the soundcheck before gigs. “The road is a good place for me to catch up on my hand technique, since I don’t get much time to practice behind a kit,” he shares. “When I’m home, I mostly work on four-way independence, new drumkit techniques, or writing and recording music. I’m usually in this room seven days a week for a few hours each day.”

Virgil has about twenty snare drums that he keeps in his room, including his Pearl Signature Series. The majority of his collection consists of various sizes and models of Pearl metal and wood snares. He also owns a couple of Brady snare drums, a Society solid brass snare drum made by a good friend of his in Australia, and a unique Italian custom snare drum made by Le Soprano. “It’s always good to have a selection of quality snare drums when recording,” states Virgil. “ A snare drum that sounds great on one song may sound horrible onn the next, so you need to have a variety of voices to choose from.”
Virgil’s keyboard rig is mainly used during rehearsals with his band, but he also uses it as a writing tool when he’s practicing on the drums. “Many times I’ll come up with a new rhythmic idea on the drums”, he explains, “and then I’ll go to the keyboard to create a melodic line that I can use to help develop my rhythmic idea on the drumkit. On occasion this type of practice will lead to a large idea that becomes the foundation for a new song.

Still, Donati does most of his composing at his condo, located where West Hollywood border Beverly Hills. there he records tracks onto a Mac dual-processor G4 running Digital Performer software, with an M-Audio Keystation Pro 88 used as his controller keyboard. He also has a variety of keyboard modules and soft synths, and employ the Finale software program for writing charts.

Virgil explains why he chose the West Hollywood area to live: “This is a vibrant area with good access to the best of everything in LA, including many studios. The drive to my rehearsal studio is reasonable and I seldom encounter the kind of traffic that LA is renowned for. Plus I have a great neighborhood to run through for my morning jog.”