There is so much heavy coordination involved in learning the Afro-Cuban styles that it’s easy to neglect simply getting the bell patterns right— which is a lot like playing jazz without spending any time working […]
Author: Todd Bishop
Page of Guaguancó
Lately I’ve been whittling away at my ignorance of Afro-Cuban/Salsa drumming, and here we’ll look at Guaguancó (say wah-wahn-CO), or Rumba Guaguancó, a very distinctive and popular style I first became acquainted with via a […]
Additional tom moves
If like me you’ve been working the hell out of the pages o’ coordination (me, I’ve been hitting the Afro 6/8, the 6/8 Rumba clave, and the page of Mozambique) you may be getting a […]
More technique
This is one of the more memorable quotes from the pianist Kenny Werner’s book Effortless Mastery— I think a lot of people noticed it, and fully embraced it: Once after playing a concert an interviewer […]
VOQOTD: Lew Tabackin on Billy Higgins
“Playing with Billy was like heaven. He was the greatest collaborator in the history of jazz. He played exactly right for you at exactly the right time. His dynamics were perfect, he balanced his energy […]
Page o’ coordination: 6/8 clave in the right hand
Hey, we haven’t had a page o’ coordination in awhile. I’ve been spending a lot of time with the Afro-Cuban stuff lately, via our page of Mozambique, the 6/8 page from last year, and with […]
Groove o’ the day: Bill Withers — Lovely Night For Dancing
This is by 70’s session drummer Alvin Taylor, who’s fairly little-known, but is on a lot of stuff. Here he’s with Bill Withers, on the album Menagerie. The song, Lovely Night For Dancing, is kind of […]
Good reading
Ignore the model’s bad posture, tucked-in muscle shirt, and Bay City Rollers hairdo, and buy the book. If you’ve worked with Ted Reed’s Syncopation in any serious way you’ve probably sensed that it has a […]
Page of polyrhythms
I’m bogging down in a couple of very wordy pieces, so a little light fare today— just a page of two-voice polyrhythms written out in the simplest possible form. They are written in the form […]
Page of Mozambique — UPDATED
I’ve been working with our earlier page of Mozambique quite a bit (yes, I do in fact practice the non-transcription stuff I post here), and thought it could use a bit of refining, so here […]