I’ll keep going on this. For some reason a lot of the comments I make on Reddit stand pretty well on their own, out of context. By contrast, my stuff on Bluesky all goes like:
Or:
So, some Reddit comments made in the couple of weeks since the last one of these. There’ll be some repetition among these, since people are always dealing with the same issues, I’m not going to worry about that:
Set your metronome to give you the 1 only, or the 1 every two measures, and practice that way all the time— be able to play all your stuff that way. I’m talking playing normal tempos— if your playing 120, set it to 30, and eventually 15.
That forces you to subdivide before you even start— and be thinking about time, all the time– and then your hands have to learn to follow you, and be stating time, all the time.
You’ll figure it out in a week, you won’t even notice it soon.
Transcribe it yourself, if you need a transcription.
Cranking the bottom head doesn’t do anything good.
The first thing to understand is, you’re not playing three rhythms, you’re playing one rhythm using two or more voices.
For each measure, figure out the single rhythm of all the parts combined, and the combinations of voices you need to execute it— which single voice, which combinations of unisons.
I don’t think about creativity, I’m thinking time and sound, and playing things where they’re going to sound good.
I don’t think about complex or advanced either, there’s just dense and less dense. I work up a good amount of soloistic stuff, maybe it comes out in a fill, maybe not— I’m not thinking my way through it to try to force in something complicated.
An easy place to start is with alternating 16ths, add accents, open drags and short rolls.
Do that on the hihat, move your hand to the snare on beats 2 and 4, add bass drum.
Listen to some music you can play now.
I decided a long time ago that this is what I was doing, as my job, it’s what I do. So you do it because you said you do it. Some days that means trudging your ass in and doing it despite not feeling excited about it.
You try not to do it in a stupidly hard way that’s going to burn you out. 8 hours is fine, just, do something you’re interested in. None of the nonsense people learned in gym class about to improve applies here. Do the brutally demanding stuff sparingly.
You also have to be grounded on planet earth, like with real music, as it is being played professionally, in your city. If you’re watching videos and thinking whatever technical/technique thing somebody practiced is how it’s done, forget it, you’re not going go anywhere with this.
Figure out how to like what you do, or figure out how to make something you like. Entertain the possibility that the standards you’re setting for yourself might be bullshit.
Nothing’s wrong with finger technique, I’d consider it an add on to a normal mostly-wrist technique. I basically never use it for any significant purpose.
Usually there’s some system of stickings underlying it, like the fundamental thing for a lot of people has the right hand leading— that hand plays the cymbal, and moves around the most, and leads most movement around the drums. If somebody doesn’t have real trained hands, they’re still going to have patterns of movement based on whatever’s comfortable for them.
In general people practice to add things to that, to have some more freedom, either with other systems of stickings, or they’re attempting to train flexibility to move on impulse, off of a system.
With a lot of video people there’s a deliberate display reason to do one thing or another, they do a lot of choreographing just for visual effect.
I never had a great reason to set up a third tom tom. I just need a high sound and a low sound, adding a middle sound doesn’t add a lot. Can’t say I’ve noticed any great playing limitation.
What the heck, I’ll close with one more Bluesky thing, the context of which you do NOT want to know:
I am happy to help you with any of the materials on the site, and with anything else drumming related— contact me for private lessons, online world wide, or in person in Portland, Oregon. All levels of players, and all people, are welcome.
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