No big deal, just a page of six stroke roll combinations and phrases, in 16th notes and 16th triplets. I call them that under duress, it just happens to be the common name for this […]
Things to listen for – ballads
Some things aren’t easily dealt with in transcriptions— you just have to listen a lot and notice things, and use them when you play. Here we’ll look at ballads, and the information you want to […]
Other things besides speed
A lot of us have very limited imaginations about how to get better playing the drums— basically, do it faster and that’s it. There are other things— sound, dynamics, touch, a number of musical considerations. […]
Very occasional quote of the day: one way
“I’m one of the cats that used to start them playing like lightning. We used to play like lightning all night long up at Minton’s sometimes. I got tired playing fast all the time. You […]
Syncopation p. 38 in quarter note triplets
Rewriting the very famous page 38 exercise from Syncopation, with all the syncopated rhythms replaced by approximately similar quarter note triplet rhythms. Someday I’ll forgo the bass drum line— which I include out of respect […]
Scale, purpose, context, and economics
Random artistic/critical concept time, about assessing a piece of art or design, or anything else in life. Assessing meaning “liking things or not.” Everything, all around us, every day, we’re surrounded by little things we […]
Rock beats with fill phrases
Using this framework a lot with my students in recent months, marking up Funky Primer with a Sharpie, putting accents over the bass drum notes to indicate a crash, marking over the remaining notes with […]
Free triplet game
Free in cost, free in method. A jazz drumming exerise for getting some variety into your playing, free of meter concerns. The parts here are written two or three beats long, but play them over […]
Reed tweak: RH lead – Guy’s variation
One of my students, age 12, accidentally invented a really good way of handling the right hand lead Reed system. You have to watch out for things like that. Sometimes mistakes point to a better […]
An aside: what the music wants
[ File this under rants. Get my new book if you enjoy this type of thing. ] Hey, everybody stop talking about “what the music wants”, “what the music requires” like it’s something outside yourself. […]
4:3lets in 4/4 – 01
Page of basic 4:3 tuplet rhythms in 4/4 time— four quarter notes in the space of 3— with rests: I don’t know what we’re calling the rhythm when written this way, but what it is […]
Daily best music in the world: Port of Entry
Weather Report absolutely crushing Port of Entry live in London, 1980: Originally recorded on Night Passage, one of my favorite albums ever. I made a loop from that that is really fun to play with. […]