For once there’s not much to say– here’s one of my favorite drum breaks in the world, played by Ringo Starr on Birthday, by the Beatles: Get the pdf YouTube audio after the break:
Category: drums
Groove o’ the day: Paul Motian’s tango
I like this feature, and I’m going to try to do a lot more of these this year. Here’s a hip modified tango played by Paul Motian on the tune When We Go, from Rambler […]
Scholar’s corner: Elvin Jones plays the ride cymbal
We’ll see how long this new feature lasts. I’ve been coming across a good number of scholarly works online, most of them not worth sharing– in fact, I have a draft of a long post […]
Groove o’ the day: alternate Afro 6/8
Here is a another, simplified Afro 6/8 groove as played by one of the major session guys for Blue Note Records in the early 60’s, Roger Humphries, here on the tune Mary Lou from Horace […]
Lessons are a whole different thing
Metaphor for complexity. It’s easy to wonder if drummers online are giving away the away the entire store with all of the free video lessons, blog posts and whatnot. With such a massive volume of […]
DBMITW: all Elvin, all the time
This current Elvin binge really snuck up on me. It’s easy to lazily categorize his playing as a style– but then you listen to something like this, which we’ve all heard a thousand times, and […]
Stick Control in triplets
Here’s a good library companion to my Stick Control implied rhythms piece. This was suggested to me by my friend Steve Pancerev— I’m not sure if it’s something he thought up, or if it was […]
Hemiola basics
UPDATE: I have since written an updated version of this page. The hemiola— also called the 3:2 polyrhythm– is a basic polyrhythm using layered even two and three note rhythms. What I’ve done here is […]
Groove o’ the day: Zigaboo Modeliste – People Say
Today’s groove o’ the day is Zigaboo Modeliste’s part from People Say, by The Meters: The 16ths are half-swung in the New Orleans style (“in between the cracks”, as Stanton Moore calls it). Listen to […]
Elvin’s Afro-Waltz: in 5/4, part 2
Man, I’ve been writing way too many words recently. Let’s get back to the drums. I’m still spending most of my time with page one of this series, but here’s another variation on the Elvin […]
Metronome perspectives
There’s an excellent piece on the Modern Drummer site getting views on metronome use from a number of top drummers and educators. I’ve excerpted some of the best bits, but go read the whole thing. […]
DBMITW: more Cecil
This is from my other favorite Cecil Taylor record, Looking Ahead!, with Denis Charles on drums. Charles plays his cymbal (in 1950’s, at least) in a way you would have a hard time getting away […]