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 […]
Category: exercises
Inversions of Three Camps
So I have basically a one-track mind. Maybe a two-track mind. Three closely-related tracks. Right now it’s all the Elvin waltz and Three Camps. What we have here is a little thing I improvised while […]
5s around the drums
I’ve enjoying practicing my previous around-the-drums things so much, I thought I’d run it through a few iterations- similar to my multi-page paradiddle exercise– and see what we get. Today it’s 16th note 5s, using […]
Tom moves
This Elvin thing is turning into a real epic– well, a very small epic, maybe, if you think about it- and I still have to complete the transcription. Here are the tom moves I would […]
Todd’s methods: triplet funk with Reed, pt. 2
In case you were playing through part 1 and wondering what the big deal is, here’s the actual thing. It looks complicated because there’s a lot of ink on the page, but each step of […]
Todd’s methods: triplet funk with Reed
I guess it’s going to be nothing but Todd’s-this/Todd’s-that this week. Fine. This is preparation for an old thing of mine I was just working through with a returning student, and I realized I had […]
Todd’s waltz
Or, the presumptuously-named Todd’s waltz, as I call it. I’m not attempting to claim the radical innovation of adding a hihat on the & of 3, it’s just how I often play a waltz, and […]
Four in three in four in 4/4
This an item inspired by Elvin Jones’ rolling triplet thing, written by my friend Stephen Pancerev- we just spent an afternoon rifling through his notebooks of original exercises, cryptic scribblings, etc, and this is the […]
Six stroke rolls around the drums
I’m just cranking them out today. I’ve been using the last paradiddles around the drums thing so much I decided to write up something similar using another familiar solo pattern, the six stroke roll (as […]
MD column: hi-hat technique
OK, I’m not meaning to turn this into a fair-use abusing, exclusively old Modern Drummer stuff blog, but a longer post is taking its sweet time getting finished, and this is just what I happen […]
First-inversion paradiddles around the drums
2024 UPDATE: Wow, this page looks like crap. See my new bigger and better page of this. This came up in my own practice today— straight conditioning movements around the drums, using the very traditional […]
Stick Control implied rhythms
I hope you dig all of this Stick Control stuff; I just happen to be working with this book a lot right now. One of my reservations I’ve always had about it- about the way […]