More from the book Piano Mastery by Harriette Brower, here is Yolanda Mero (1887-1963)— like everybody in this book, the type of language she uses is dated, and a little long winded, but everyone will […]
Category: practicing
Practice phrase for Chapin
A very small item here, for making your time practicing single measures of independence patterns a little more productive. Try it when practicing Chapin— that Advanced Techniques for the Modern Drummer— or for any other […]
Brute force freedom
Not Mickey Roker, never will be In the Josef Hoffman piano technique post I said: We read this now and put an emphasis on the freedom part, but he’s talking about freedom through massive technical abilities— […]
It’s suspect: nothing but singles, doubles, and flams
New recurring (maybe) feature, inspired by Modern Drummer’s It’s Questionable column. I’ll call it It’s Suspect, and say a few words about an annoyingly wrong but persistent drumming myth. This question was asked on a […]
Converting 3/8 hemiola patterns to 2/4
That’s it, CRUISE SHIP DRUMMER! is now an all what-I’m-teaching-in-lessons web site. I’m preoccupied with other stuff right now, travel plans and whatnot. I started doing this around 2013, and quite a bit lately— changing […]
Too perfect
Perfect and boring For a long time I thought robotic perfection was basically impossible to achieve for people not practicing massive hours… so you may as well just try your best to achieve it. Lately, […]
Max wants you to turn off YouTube
“We used to listen to records and take off the record what the person was doing. You didn’t see the person. You’d just hear it. We’d figure out what was happening with our ears. Then […]
Delayed continuity
I’ve been looking some piano literature lately, reading an old book called Practising the Piano (British spelling) by Frank Merrick. You can get it on Scribd without having to pay anyone but Scribd. Another site […]
Very occasional quote of the day: practicing vs. playing
Most important thing on this site: DL: How important is it to play, and how important is it to practice on your own? SM: It’s more important to play. I’ve always felt that playing is […]
Tempo and practicing
Yes, it is. This always hung me up— the seemingly infinite tempo possibilities for any one thing you practice. It was a constantly lurking thing that I’m not doing this fast enough, and you would […]
What are we doing
Been having a minor existential crisis in the last week or so— I played my first session in over a year last week, was feeling really unpracticed and generally out of touch with music… and […]
What I’m practicing
I’m at the point where I’ve published so much stuff on the site, I’m a little embarrassed. I don’t want people thinking I’m just fascinated with writing patterns. I do practice this stuff, and otherwise […]