Strictly Technique
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STRICTLY TECHNIQUE - One-Sided Hairtas, Grandmas, and Grandpas
This month we’re going to look at three unusual rudiments: one-sided hairtas, grandmas, and grandpas. These three closely related rudiments are especially useful for drumset fills when playing the accents on toms or cymbals and the unaccented notes on the…
STRICTLY TECHNIQUE - A Twist on the Buzz
A drummer once approached me after a show and said, “Your rolls sound as smooth as running water.” This statement gave me a new sonic goal, and that’s now what I think about when playing a closed roll. This lesson…
Build a More Balanced Double-Stroke Roll
Strictly Technique Build a More Balanced Double-Stroke Roll Inverting the Diddles to Increase Strength and Precision by Jeff W. Johnson This month we’ll examine a technique used to balance out the double-stroke roll. A double-stroke roll should have a machine-gun-type…
STRICTLY TECHNIQUE - Nine Over Two
The simplest way to think about a nine-over-two polyrhythm is by dividing each partial of a quarter-note triplet into another triplet. In this lesson, we’re adding accent patterns to this polyrhythm. TO READ THE FULL STORY: SUBSCRIBE TO ACCESS LOG…
Closed Roll Studies - Exercises for Developing Control of Multiple Rebounds
The closed roll, aka buzz roll, is a mystery to many drummers, and for good reason. This type of roll attempts to imitate the long tone that other instruments, like trumpet or violin, create by sustaining a single pitch. TO…
Quintuplets, Part 1: The Basics
Some may think of quintuplets—groups of five notes in the space of a quarter note—as an unusual rhythm reserved for the technical folks playing math music. But quintuplets aren’t that different from triplets (which weren’t always commonplace), and it’s possible…
Strictly Technique - Hearing The Click On The "E"
In this lesson, we’ll work on shifting our perception of a metronome so that we’re hearing each quarter-note pulse as the second 16th note, or “e,” of each beat. Benny Greb has talked about using this concept to help improve…
Strictly Technique - Swiss Rudiments
Welcome to the first of a four-part series on Swiss rudiments and Basel drumming. In this lesson I’ll focus on some specialties of the Basel style that aren’t usually included in the standard list of forty Percussive Arts Society rudiments.…
1,000 Ways to Practice a Single Page - Part 2: More Rhythmic Interpretations
In Part 1 of this series, we began exploring different approaches to utilize and practice a single page of rhythm. We started on the snare with 16th-note subdivisions while accenting the rhythms on the page. In this lesson we’ll take…
Swiss Rudiments - Basel Drumming, Part 4
In this lesson we’ll take a look at a song from Camp Duty Update, my most recent book about the history of rudiments and their European roots. The melody of the tune “The Slow Scotch” was used in nineteenth-century military…
Swiss Rudiments - Basel Drumming, Part 3
In the third installment of our series on Swiss drumming, we’ll continue exploring the European roots of rudiments. In the last lesson we introduced Tagwacht pieces—music that’s typically used to awaken soldiers. The piece “Three Camps” could be considered an…
1,000 Ways to Practice a Single Page, Part 1: Introducing the Method
I’ve always wanted a system for practicing different subjects that I can take with me anywhere without having to lug around a heavy stack of books. My students often forgot materials for their lessons, so we ended up using any…
