One aspect of drumming that I enjoy very much is playing around with time. I can remember listening to some amazing lick or passage, and being completely baffled by what I heard. Almost instinctively, I would rush to the turntable in an attempt to figure out note for note what had just transpired, not giving any thought to the inevitable wearing out of the grooves and eventual ruin of the record. These memorable drumming moments are often the result of “playing around with time.” One such method of playing around with time is through dis- placing a repeating group of notes. For example, take a measure of 16th notes. Most often, they are played in succession with emphasis on the downbeat. My suggestion is to play these same four groupings of four notes, but start them on either the “e,” “and,” or “ah,” rather than “one.” In the following example, […]

November 1986 Issue