Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Essential Drum Advices
Essential Drum Advices
Essential Drum Advices
By Aaron J. Reinhard
The Mistakes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
If you want to get the most out of this book, here’s the best way to do
it: read straight through it now to familiarize yourself with the ideas.
Then, in the future, when you’re having trouble in your playing, and just
can’t seem to get something right, come back to it for inspiration, or as
a reference manual.
Have you ever watched a movie the second time and realized you
totally missed a scene or a line, even though it was definitely in there
the first time? This happens because our brain gets caught up on one
idea and runs with it, which means we miss the next little pieces.
Reading this book multiple times will allow you to absorb all of the
information, and make sure you don’t miss anything important.
The most important part of technique is making sure that you stay
LOOSE while you play. I’ll often ask my students to pull my stick out of
my hand so that they can feel just how loose my grip is. The stick slides
out with ease.
If you have tension in your body while you’re playing, it will just keep
getting worse, and building up throughout your practice routine, or
God forbid, your performance. This tension is your body saying, “Hey
buddy, you’re doing it wrong.” Listen to your body and get rid of it.
This may cause you to drop sticks on occasion, but knocking a stick out
of one of your hands while playing is actually a good sign! (Just be
careful not to overdo it.)
Adjust the location of your pedals to where your feet sit naturally and
you can fit your snare drum comfortably in between your legs. Let your
arms hang naturally with you sticks in playing position. If the tips of
your sticks aren’t meeting in the center of the drum, reposition it so
that they do.
The other drums and cymbals should be placed within an easy reach.
No need to overstretch. Make it comfortable for your body.
Did you notice how many times I said the words naturally and
comfortably in this section? It’s absolutely crucial that you don’t have
to overexert yourself to play. Don’t make it any harder than it has to
be.
The tendency to play too loud comes into play with more experienced
drummers and specifically when playing with bands. Learn to listen to
the balance of the group and make sure you’re not drowning anyone
out. (especially the singer - you’ll get fired REAL quick for that one.)
This said - when you’re supposed to rock out, rock out! Screw playing
softly if it doesn’t fit the music! The important thing here is knowing
when it’s appropriate and when you’re just being a really loud jerk.
That’s right, we’re playing more than one instrument, but we have to
make them blend together and sound like one. Sometimes we play the
hi hats too loud. Sometimes the snare isn’t loud enough. I mean come
on - we’re mostly right handed and there’s not enough room to wind
up and smack the snare drum hard with the left hand.
Volume
120
100
80
60
Volume
40
20
0
Hi Hat Snare Drum Bass Drum
It’s the relative volume between the instruments that’s important, not
the actual numbers themselves. The kick and snare drums make up the
most important parts of the beat, so keep them forefront, while the hi
hat keeps a consistent time at a lower volume. Balancing your playing
this way will instantly make it sound more professional.
This is your primary job as the drummer of the band. You need to play
solidly enough to keep everyone else together. So where are the most
common problem areas for unintentional tempo shifts? I’m glad you
asked, because I have a list:
- In technical/challenging passages
AND OF COURSE
- FILLS
Speaking of fills…
Got it?
Ok, continuing…
Is it:
DON’T PLAY TOO MANY FILLS, AND KEEP THEM SHORT AND SWEET FOR
“If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what
you’ve always gotten.”
Mistake #8 - We push the sticks/pedals too hard into the drum heads.
This can create a dead sound, an unwanted buzz sound, or other extra
strokes. The sticks need to bounce out of the drum head like a
basketball. If you’re applying the advice from tip #1 (staying loose) this
shouldn’t be a major issue for you, as this is what allows the sticks and
pedals to bounce freely.
Newton’s third law of motion tells us that this will happen - for every
action there is an equal and opposite reaction. The stick wants to come
out, and you’re actually stopping it. By loosening your grip, the stick
can now freely return to where it started, saving you energy, and
creating a clearer, more open drum sound.
This one is pretty much self explanatory. Your drums should resonate
and “sing”. There’s no need to cover their mouths with abusive
amounts of duct tape. (You’re already beating them as it is…)
I’m not saying that all muffling is bad, and a lot of beginner level sets
require at least some to sound good. If you’re snare drum is a little too
ringy, by all means, put a piece of moon gel on it. If your toms are
ringing for 10 seconds before decaying and you need more attack, slap
some studio rings on them. All I’m saying is just be careful not to
overdo it.
DUCT TAPING YOUR DAD’S OLD SOCKS TO YOUR FLOOR TOM HEAD IS
OVERDOING IT!
Don’t be a jerk. No one wants to play with someone who has a huge
ego. This aspect is sometimes even more important that your playing
abilities, so make sure you can get along with your band mates.
Why would you want to make music with people who you aren’t
friends (or at the very least friendly) with anyways?
I recommend using the left side of your body (or right if you’re a lefty)
to do everything throughout the day. I used to spray/wash dishes with
my left hand, open doors left handed, make/cut pizzas left handed, etc.
Try brushing your teeth left handed, and still not being able to do it as
well as with your right hand after a year… Look for opportunities to be
developing your overall skills all day long.
Always wanting to be the fastest, acting like we’re still in high school,
and ignoring feel and groove. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got no problem
with playing fast, (I happen to enjoy doing it at times myself), but it’s
not the most important aspect of music. We’ve got to play musically
for people to want to listen.
Here’s an easy way to get started doing this if you’ve never tried
playing a “4 Way Coordination” (that’s a GREAT drumming book, by the
way) before. Have one of your limbs match the others, so it’s kind of
like you’re still playing 3 limbs - maybe 3.5. Then start to vary it. You
can have the hi hat start by matching the eighth notes on the ride
cymbal, and then switch it to quarters or offbeats. Try the opposite too
- eighths on the hi hat foot and quarters or off beats on the ride.
If you have trouble playing a 4 limb coordination, I’ll give you the secret
to being able to perform anything you set your mind to. You need to
find which 2 or 3 limbs are the problem area, because if you can’t do all
four, it just means that you can’t execute this combination by itself.
Work on these combos a ton of times, and then add limbs back in as it
gets more comfortable.
Loud & Soft. Fast & Slow. Long & Short. High & Low. These contrasts
are what make music exciting and interesting. Whether we realize it or
not these dynamic capabilities are the reason that we listen to our
favorite bands. Think of some of your favorite tunes. At the part where
the music changes tempo or volume you’ll feel a drastic change in
energy.
Learn to make any changes you make in the volume of your playing first
noticeable - often we think we’re changing dynamics more drastically
than we are - and then exciting, by playing your softs softer, and your
louds louder. When you’re practicing crescendos, start at the absolute
softest volume you can play at, and build to the loudest volume you can
reach. Also, most of us spend a lot of time practicing at medium to
loud volume levels. Practicing for extended periods of time at a low
volume level on a pad(perhaps at night when others are sleeping to
maximize your practice time and not have to give up any time whaling
on the drums at your favorite dynamic level - fffff) will actually increase
your control over the sticks at the loud volume level.
NO ONE WANTS TO HEAR THE SAME THING OVER AND OVER. CHANGE
IT UP!
Mistake #15 - We hit our cymbals the wrong way and get bad sounds.
The next time I see someone hit a crash cymbal with the tip of their
nylon tipped Easton (Ahead) baseball bat sticks I might die. What an
anti-climactic way to play! You can’t change into a big section of a song
with a weak attack on your crash cymbal. It just doesn’t serve the
music.
This is how you hit your ride cymbal and hi hat most of the time, but
not the ideal way to hit your crash cymbal. Now, music is an art, not a
science, so there will be times where it’s acceptable to play your crash
cymbals in this manner, but you have to know when to do it, and when
to not do it. When you want that big, full crash sound, you’ve gotta hit
the edge of the cymbal with the shaft of the stick.
The hi hat should be hit with the tip of the stick most of the time - not
always though. When I’m playing open hi hats, I almost always play
them in the same manner as hitting a crash cymbal. Also, alternating
between the shaft on edge/tip on bow is a great way to get accent
differentiation in terms of tone AND volume. I use this trick on the ride
cymbal too - hit the bell with the shaft of your stick (it just sounds more
full than with the tip) and then the bow of the cymbal with the tip.
This one goes back to the contrast idea. If you want your accents to be
heard and effective they must be played at a volume that allows the
listener to distinguish the accents from the non-accents. Many novice
drummers just think because they know what they meant to play that
everyone else does too. Not true. You’ve got to exaggerate your
playing for the listener to truly “get the message”.
Again, softs must be played softer, and louds must be played louder.
This analogy has worked well for my students in the past - the
difference in volume between your accents and non-accents should be
more like the difference in height between a tree and grass, rather than
a tree and a bush. The more drastic the difference, the more obvious
your intent will be to your audience, and the more exciting your playing
will sound.
The accents have to “pop”, that is, stand out from your softer interior
notes. A common tendency when students begin to play these notes
quieter is to back off a little bit on the accent. DON’T DO THIS! I must
keep stressing that it’s the differentiation between the volume of these
notes that is the key to their effectiveness.
Straight up - if you can’t, at the very least, name me your top 3 favorite
drummers right now, you need to figure out their names, (saying “that
guy from Led Zeppelin doesn’t count”) or pick out who they are in the
first place (saying that guy from Led Zeppelin doesn’t count). The more
you get into studying a drummer’s style, the more you’ll hear the subtle
differences that give each drummer his or her own personality, and the
better you will be at defining yours.
Listen to the nuances that make these drummers and their songs feel
so great. What about it makes people dance? Or bob their head?
When I hear another musician play, I’m always thinking - what does he
do better than me? - and then I emulate it and integrate it into my own
playing. Don’t feel like you need to create things from scratch. Listen
to the great ones who’ve come before us, and use their ideas.
“I only listen to Slipknot, and bands that sound like Slipknot. Slipknot is
the best band ever. Don’t you think so?” Guess what that drummer’s
band is going to sound like. Yup, Slipknot. Boring. Be your own
drummer.
We need to draw influence from all types of music. Now, I know that
not everyone is going to like every type of music. But I strongly believe
that there’s good music in every genre - yes, even country. There’s
horrible music in every genre too - and a lot of it gets played on the
radio. So, you need to dig a little bit to find it, but it’s there.
Do you want your drums to be high or low? Jazzers tend to tune up,
while rock/metal drummers tend to tune them down low to get that
“drums from hell” sound. Maybe you’ll like somewhere in between.
You’ve got to experiment, and see what sounds best for your playing.
- When tuning a drum for the first time after changing a head, make
sure you tighten the lugs in a star pattern. (see photo for order on 5, 6,
and 8 lug drums)
- Match the pitch of the top head to the pitch of the bottom head.
From here, it’s common to raise the pitch of the bottom head just a
hair, but again this is an experiment. If you like it, keep it.
- Pay attention to how the heads feel, as well as how they sound,
because this will have a huge effect on your playing.
Get a list of the 40 basic drum rudiments, a good teacher, and start
learning them. Learn them first on the pad, and then start applying
them to the drum set, and don’t get me started on all the different
ways you can start to apply them. They’re literally infinite.
This is what is called pride. Drop it as soon as you can. Preferably right
NOW. It stops many naturally talented drummers from growing to
even greater heights. Keep learning. Keep playing.
The players who continue developing, while they may not be as skilled
to begin with, learn to overcome their challenges and surpass the
cocky, natural drummer in time. They also get to the point where
everything they play seems natural, in spite of all the time and effort
they put into learning these skills.
It has been said that knowledge is power, but this is not true. If I read a
recipe for a cake, I theoretically “know” how to make a cake, but that
doesn’t make a cake appear. The truth is that the application of
knowledge is power. You may have to make a few cakes before you
can do it well, and just the same, you’ll have to play some patterns A
LOT to really know them. But, if you put in the work you’ll reap the
rewards.
Yet another myth, that simply isn’t true. Practice forms habits.
Therefore if you’re practicing a pattern incorrectly, you’re getting
better at doing it wrong. The quality of practice is more important than
the amount.
Don’t get me wrong, the more you practice, the better you’ll get, but it
has to be effective and efficient practice. ONLY PERFECT PRACTICE
MAKES PERFECT. And this is the only way that you’re going to get
things right. Quality over quantity.
Sometimes you’ll have to play a groove much slower than you want to
to get it right. This method is FAR superior to struggling through it and
making a thousand mistakes a minute at a faster tempo. If you do that
you’re just getting better at making more mistakes, faster. Slow down
and get it right this time. The speed will come with time. So,
remember…
He received several scholarships for music, and studied in the Music Performance
Program at The University of Michigan – Flint. In his time there, he performed all
over the U.S., with the World-Renowned steel drum band – The Steelheads.
Notable concerts while he was here include The Detroit Jazz Festival with steel
drum innovator, Andy Narell, The Syracuse Jazz Festival, The Flint Jazz Festival,
and a terrace showcase concert at PASIC. (You should go sometime…)
This performance was Aaron’s first journey to the Percussive Art Society’s annual
convention, but it would not be his last. He attended the following five years as
well soaking up as much information as possible from the greats in the drumming
world to improve his own teaching and playing.
His current focus is on writing and sharing all that he’s learned through his
journey with others to help them cut as much time out of their learning curve as
possible.
You can reach Aaron by emailing him here or adding him on facebook.