Ms. Dagati said, “I don’t think you ever get too old to want to feel like a rock star.”

Richard Cotton, an exercise physiologist and the national director of certification for the American College of Sports Medicine, pronounced Pound more challenging than Drums Alive “because of the core strength and flexibility required to reach the floor.” But Drums Alive, he added, can still be very aerobic.” Skeptics take note: “If you’re in decent shape for either one of these workouts, you’re going to burn at least as many calories as any other vigorous group exercise class,” he said. “It’s certainly not going to be less.”

Even air drumming has started getting some respect, at least aerobically. Ari Gold, the writer and director of the 2008 air-drumming comedy “Adventures of Power” (and, to his amusement, “accidentally the world emissary of something so sublimely ridiculous”), last year ended up air-performing Van Halen’s “Hot for Teacher” for an audience of 5,000 in Finland. “It was by far the most intense workout I’ve ever had,” said Mr. Gold, whose film’s cast included (drum roll, please) Adrian Grenier. (Ari Gold is also the name of Mr. Grenier’s character’s agent on the television show “Entourage.” In real life, the pair are members of a band called the Honey Brothers; Mr. Grenier is the drummer.)

Mr. Cotton said: “Even if you’re just drumming randomly, all of your limbs are moving. That’s a ton of core work.”

Marcus Smith, who worked with England’s Olympic boxing team and studies sports and exercise physiology at the University of Chichester in England, has been waiting for a drumming fitness boom.

Over an eight-year period, Dr. Smith and his team ran tests on Clem Burke of Blondie, measuring his heart rate, oxygen uptake and levels of lactic acid in his blood while on tour. (Dr. Smith has been a Blondie fan since he was 15 and, he said, “in love with Debbie Harry.”) Mr. Burke’s heart rate averaged 140 to 150 beats per minute, which is roughly equivalent to running 10-minute miles, with peaks at 190 beats, or five-minute miles. “You try getting on a treadmill and matching that for three hours night after night,” said Dr. Smith, who estimated that only a professional athlete could. Mr. Burke, now the namesake for the Clem Burke Drumming Project, which has also worked with drummers from Bloc Party and Primal Scream, burned nearly 600 calories an hour in concert. That’s more than he would have burned running, Dr. Smith said.