Apostrophe: drum transcriptions besides the AI ones

Frank Zappa · DiscReet 1974 · measured 2026-09-05
9album tracks
9tracks with a non-AI source
10human Songsterr drum tabs
2printed charts
5Guitar Pro files of our own
6AI tabs, for contrast
0tracks with nothing at all
Apostrophe is the best-covered Zappa record on this Mac. Eight of the nine tracks carry a human drum reading, and the ninth is the one with a printed chart. Compare Roxy & Elsewhere, where two tracks of ten carry a human tab and no printed chart exists at all.
What counts as a drum transcription here. A drum staff has to hold real notes, rests excluded. Songsterr classifies its own uploads with an aiGenerated flag, and every row reads that flag off the meta API rather than guessing from the author name. A printed chart counts when the page carries drum-kit notation, confirmed by opening the image.

Track by track

Green rows are transcriptions Brandon authored. The AI column is here for contrast, so a track showing an AI tab and nothing else has no human reading of the drums.

#TrackLengthHuman Songsterr tabPrinted chartOur own filesAI tab, for contrast
1Don't Eat the Yellow Snow2:07s35866
MarkDubya · 560 drum notes · 38 bars
Cruise Ship Drummer print
Todd Bishop on Ralph Humphrey
~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-drum-sources/01-cruiseshipdrummer/transcription-ralph-humphrey-dont-eat-the-yellow-snow_p01.jpg
1236x1600 JPEG beside a one-page PDF. Full page, legend reading crash, hihat, high tom, snare, low tom, bass and hihat/foot. Marked Transcription begins at 0:32, barred 7/8 against 7/4, bar numbers to 33, ends Segue to Nanook Rubs It. Copyright 2013 Todd Bishop.
nones2549677 ai
Hodd Toward · 599 notes · 36 bars
s6075883 ai
Shawn Rieder · 934 notes · 85 bars
single version
s1459839 ai
jean-robert chiasson · 674 notes · 72 bars
listed as Yellow Snow
2Nanook Rubs It4:38s35865 ours
Brandon chavez · 1,309 drum notes · 109 bars
ours
s35878 ours
Brandon chavez · 4,059 drum notes · 292 bars
the Nanook Suite, four tracks in one tab, ours
none2 files gp
~/Projects/_outputs/songsterr-zappa-paren-fix/s35865-Nanook-Rubs-It/
ORIGINAL pull plus RESTORE r4719269
2 files gp
~/Projects/_outputs/songsterr-zappa-paren-fix/s35878-Nanook-Suite/
ORIGINAL pull plus RESTORE r7807785
1 file gp
~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-nanook-sync-forensics/
FIXGRID rebuild of s35865 beside findings.json from the grid forensics
none
3St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast1:50s35892
femboy.gardevoir · 851 drum notes · 63 bars
s35878 ours
Brandon chavez · 4,059 drum notes · 292 bars
inside the Nanook Suite, ours
nonenonenone
4Father O'Blivion2:18s35864
femboy.gardevoir · 1,339 drum notes · 83 bars
s35878 ours
Brandon chavez · 4,059 drum notes · 292 bars
inside the Nanook Suite, ours
nonenonenone
5Cosmik Debris4:14s412177
femboy.gardevoir · 1,581 drum notes · 80 bars
nonestems
~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-cosmik-debris-hihat-audit/
1.9 GB of our own stem work on the LIVE take, not the album take. Source wav, Demucs drums stem, six DrumSep lanes as kick, snare, toms, hh, ride and crash, plus hat_analyze.py, hh_verdict.py and lane_verdict.py with both tab JSONs pulled for comparison.
s1154774 ai
DavidxHanes · 3,135 notes · 159 bars
live take
6Excentrifugal Forz1:33s1014276
Kevin Sheppard · 143 drum notes · 9 bars
nine bars, an excerpt
nonenonenone
7Apostrophe’5:50none
s35873, the studio tab, carries zero drum tracks
Cruise Ship Drummer print
Todd Bishop on Jim Gordon
~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-drum-sources/01-cruiseshipdrummer/transcription-jim-gordon-apostrophe_p01.jpg
612x792 JPEG beside a one-page PDF. Headed Apostrophé, drum break, Drums by Jim Gordon. Marked Drum break begins at 3:22, two systems carrying (rim) and (china) marks. Copyright 2011 Todd Bishop. This is the only drum notation of the studio take anywhere on hand.
nones6035435 ai
Chris · 2,855 notes · 152 bars
Live in Los Angeles 1974
8Uncle Remus2:44s35894
femboy.gardevoir · 834 drum notes · 57 bars
nonenonenone
9Stink-Foot6:33s2382928
mariedront · 2,599 drum notes · 226 bars
s6205368
femboy.gardevoir · 2,524 drum notes · 114 bars
second upload, listed as Stink-Foot V2
nonenones4428902 ai
Alex Sorto · 651 notes · 64 bars
solo excerpt, filed under Token of my extreme

The two printed charts

Both come from Todd Bishop, published across cruiseshipdrummer.com and pdxdrummer.com, and both were confirmed by opening the image rather than by reading the filename. They cover opposite ends of the record: the track that already has the thinnest human tab, and the track that has no human tab at all.

TrackDrummerFilesWhat the page shows
Don't Eat the Yellow SnowRalph Humphrey transcription-ralph-humphrey-dont-eat-the-yellow-snow_p01.jpg, 261,313 bytes, 1236x1600
transcription-ralph-humphrey-dont-eat-the-yellow-snow__pdxdrummer.pdf, 27,156 bytes, 1 page
plus the source post as .html
A full page with a seven-line legend: crash, hihat, high tom, snare, low tom, bass, hihat/foot. Headed Frank Zappa, Apostrophe (') DiscReet. Marked Transcription begins at 0:32. Barred 7/8 against 7/4 through the opening, dropping to common time at the close. Bar numbers run to 33 and the last system reads Segue to Nanook Rubs It. Copyright 2013 Todd Bishop.
Apostrophe’Jim Gordon transcription-jim-gordon-apostrophe_p01.jpg, 40,785 bytes, 612x792
transcription-jim-gordon-apostrophe__pdxdrummer.pdf, 18,624 bytes, 1 page
Headed Apostrophé, drum break, with Drums by Jim Gordon on the right. Marked Drum break begins at 3:22. Two systems, carrying (rim) on the first and (china) on the second. Copyright 2011 Todd Bishop. It is an excerpt of the break, and it is the only drum notation of the studio take on hand.

Our own work

TrackFilesFolderWhat is in it
Nanook Rubs It2~/Projects/_outputs/songsterr-zappa-paren-fix/s35865-Nanook-Rubs-It/ORIGINAL pull plus RESTORE r4719269
Nanook Rubs It2~/Projects/_outputs/songsterr-zappa-paren-fix/s35878-Nanook-Suite/ORIGINAL pull plus RESTORE r7807785
Nanook Rubs It1~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-nanook-sync-forensics/FIXGRID rebuild of s35865 beside findings.json from the grid forensics
Cosmik Debrisstems~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-cosmik-debris-hihat-audit/1.9 GB of our own stem work on the LIVE take, not the album take. Source wav, Demucs drums stem, six DrumSep lanes as kick, snare, toms, hh, ride and crash, plus hat_analyze.py, hh_verdict.py and lane_verdict.py with both tab JSONs pulled for comparison.
Two of the nine tracks are ours on Songsterr. Nanook Rubs It s35865 carries 1,309 drum notes over 109 bars, and the Nanook Suite s35878 carries 4,059 over 292 bars across four tracks, which also covers St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast and Father O'Blivion. The Cosmik Debris folder is stem analysis of the LIVE take and holds no transcription, so it is listed here and excluded from the transcription counts.

What does not count, and why

MaterialWhereWhy it is excluded
Kasper Sloots, zappa-analysis
apostrophe.htm plus apostrophe1 to 3, cosmic-debris7 and 8, dont-eat-the-yellow-snow6 and 7, farther-oblivion4 and 6, stinkfoot-1974-2 to 5
~/Projects/_outputs/zappa-drum-sources/08-analysis/zappa-analysis/ Pitched score on treble and bass clefs with no drum staff, verified by opening the notation. It stays the best bar-and-meter map for the record and it is not a drum transcription.
Uncle Meat (YCDTOSA Vol. 2), s20690
1,330 drum notes, 96 bars, authored by Brandon chavez
Songsterr A search false positive on the Uncle Remus query. The track belongs to You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore Vol. 2 and not to this record. Ours, and out of scope here.
Don't Eat The Yellow Snow (Ukulele), s2561609Songsterr Carries no drum track.

Method

Every Songsterr figure comes from two public endpoints and no login: songsterr.com/api/meta/<songId> for the aiGenerated flag, author and revision id, then the CloudFront notation JSON per track for note counts. Notes exclude rests. Drum tracks carry instrumentId 1024.

Twelve search patterns were run at size=100, covering the nine album titles plus the short forms Yellow Snow, Nanook and Stinkfoot, since a size=30 cap on an earlier sweep of another record hid a real tab behind ninety-nine unrelated results. Nineteen Zappa songIds came back and seventeen carry a drum track.

All eighteen in-scope tabs were already in Brandon's Songsterr favorites when this was built, checked against /api/favorites with nothing missing.