Here are some different forms of the snare drum piece Three Camps— actually we’ve seen them all before, except for the last one: See this page which breaks down the piece to see how these […]
Author: Todd Bishop
Happy 4th
Oh, and happy 4th of July. Get the transcription of Billy Higgins’s playing on this.
Page o’ coordination: Afro 6 – “African”
Quite of flurry of POCs lately— a plague of POCs. I like this format. It’s good for working on more complex independence; things too hard to do with a melodic line interpretation, which is my […]
Practice loop: Watermelon Man
This is a practice loop I use a lot, sampled from the intro of Herbie Hancock’s Watermelon Man, from the album Headhunters. At 74 bpm it’s a little faster than one of my other favorites, […]
More Frank Butler – intro and break
Another little solo break by Frank Butler, along with something very interesting. The tune is Bobblin’— a bright, somewhat Mingus-like waltz— from the Curtis Amy & Frank Butler album Groovin’ Blue, recorded in 1960-61. The […]
Page o’ coordination: Mozambique – hands only – 01
A page of technical independence patterns for a Mozambique bell part— a hip, very useful bell rhythm. For more practical left hand parts for this bell rhythm, see my updated Page of Mozambique. Also see my […]
Maximizing syncopation rhythms
This is something I was doing with a Skype student recently. We’re working on jazz solo vocabulary, currently getting fluent with common jazz rhythms using basic drum set orchestrations— developing a basic Billy Higgins/Frankie Dunlop-like […]
Aka Pygmy clave
This is just a brief investigation of an interesting rhythm, a sort of clave rhythm clapped by the lead performer in the video below— a candid video of three Aka Pygmy people performing a polyphonic […]
List of basic orchestrations of a syncopated rhythm
This is just a one-page summary of elementary drum set orchestrations of a syncopated rhythm, written Ted Reed-style. I’m teaching my simple solo method to a couple of students, so a printed list of the […]
Drum intro: Billy Higgins – For Minors Only
Another intro, with a Latin feel, played by Billy Higgins on For Minors Only, from Jimmy Heath’s album Picture of Heath. The cymbal rhythm is reminiscent of a Mozambique-type rhythm, with an 8th rest on […]