Ever find yourself playing too much bass drum? It’s easy to do when, like me, you practice out of Syncopation a lot. And a thing I’ve noticed in doing so many transcriptions is how sparsely many […]
Category: exercises
Linear phrases in 3/4, mixed rhythm – 02
Here’s the companion to the Gary Chaffee linear phrases in 3/4, which I posted the other day. This page just has the same phrases displaced by one note; the last note of each phrase, a […]
Page o’ coordination: Afro-Peruvian – 01
Let’s get it out of the way up front that I know nothing about Afro-Peruvian music— I played a session with John Butler, a Portland guitarist who plays it, and he hipped me to its […]
Linear phrases in 3/4, mixed rhythm – 01
More pages of Gary Chaffee linear patterns, in two measure phrases in 3/4, with 8th notes and triplets. If I was about doing things in a logical order, I would have done these pages a […]
7/8 practice rhythms plus stickings
This was partially covered in ’15 with a similar post, but I wrote this up, so I’ll post it. Small differences in format, or in which rhythms you choose to include, can make a difference […]
A funk sticking in context: RLL – 32nd notes
Third entry in this funk stickings in context series, using the RLL pattern again, this time in a 32nd note rhythm. I do this kind of thing a lot in 32nd notes. This is an […]
Bass drum rhythms for pad practice
This is a page of bass drum rhythms I use for pad practice— I have one of those Gibraltar bass drum practice pads I sometimes use. These are good for anything with a running 8th […]
A funk sticking in context: RLRLL
Second entry in this little intermediate-level series of funk stickings in context, this time using a five-note idea: RLRLL Learn the first pattern in 5/4, and be able to count out loud along with it— […]
A funk sticking in context: RLL
This is the first of several easy pages of exercises for developing kind of an essential thing in funk and fusion drumming, which is not quite a fill and not quite a groove— it’s more […]
Reed method: fast rock – advanced
I hope you— students and teachers— are using my Reed method for playing rock beats. I think it’s one of the better things I’ve come up with— it’s just a more musical way of learning […]
Double paradiddle-adiddle
Look, it’s not my fault. I never told you I was going to have cool names for the things I make up. Direct your derision at the founding fathers of drumming who put us on […]
Paradiddle-adiddle
This may already be a “hybrid” rudiment, but I wouldn’t know, because that is not my bag. I’ve posted a few modified paradiddle things in the past (like my “3.5-adiddle”), and this is a new one […]