A few weeks ago we introduced a new term, that is totally made-up by me: skiplet. It refers to the cluster of three notes of the standard jazz ride cymbal pattern starting on beat 2, and on […]
Category: teaching
The map is not the territory…
…and this is not a pipe. Sometimes I worry that with the things we cover here— and the way we cover them— I give the impression that those are the most important things about learning […]
Completism ad absurdum
x10,000. Go. It’s kind of interesting when someone runs a common concept to its logical conclusion, forcing you to examine the premise of the original thing. In this case, the Stick Control model of practice […]
On Marv Dahlgren’s prodigious output and the purpose of a library
Three bucks to purchase, hundreds of hours to master. As I was idly visiting the Really Good Music Publishing site– the people, you’ll recall, who have reissued several out of print Marvin Dahlgren books- an […]
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 […]
Coordination “kernels”
Here’s one for the teachers. This is an approach I’ve found helpful with students having difficulties with coordination on written patterns in jazz and Latin, and a good alternative/supplement to the usual solution of “slowing […]
Billie’s Bounce deconstructed
That sounds a little sexier than it actually is- I was working on this tune with a student recently, and we ended up breaking it down phrase by phrase. I’ve written the lesson up for […]
How we used to learn the open roll
I just got a very nice note from Jim Buckley about the following comment of mine from the Drummerworld.com. Jim is a major figure in corps- he marched snare with Ghost in one of the […]
Alan Greenspan won’t let me give make-ups
Via Steve Korn, here is an economics professor’s opinion on make-up music lessons: […] I’d like to explain to other parents why I feel – quite strongly, actually – that it is unreasonable of we […]
1985 Modern Drummer interview: Alan Dawson
Have I mentioned lately what a great resource the Modern Drummer digital archive is? Here are my excerpts from a 1985 Modern Drummer interview with one of the great teachers of the drums, Alan Dawson. […]
March 1985 Modern Drummer interview: John von Ohlen
Interview with big band drummer John von Ohlen from Modern Drummer, March, 1985, by Scott K. Fish, with the many good parts pulled out here, by me. Von Ohlen toured with with the Woody Herman […]