I’ve been using these moves around the drums a lot in my own practice– if you’ve been working with the Elvin’s Afro Waltz series, you probably have too– and have evolved them slightly, so I […]
Coordination with a dotted-quarter cymbal pattern – part 1
There’s got to be a better title for that, but I don’t know what it is. Frankly, I’m just lucky if I can get anything posted at all at this point. Here we’re looking at […]
DBMITW: George Duke
Here’s Sugar Loaf Mountain, from George Duke’s Brazilian Love Affair, one of the three essential albums of his, along with Reach For It and Frank Zappa’s Roxy & Elsewhere. That’s Ricky Lawson providing the crushing […]
Groove o’ the day: Jungle Man
Another Zigaboo Modeliste groove today, from Jungle Man on The Meters album Rejuvenation: Half-swing the 16th notes– listen to the track to hear the correct interpretation. YouTube audio after the break:
Rudimental Reed: five stroke rolls
I’ve been fooling around with applying some rudiments to the long exercises in Syncopation, by Ted Reed. We’ll start humbly with it, converting the written quarter notes (and tied 8ths) to untied rolls– an 8th […]
VOQOTD: Bruce Lee
“Before I learned the art, a punch was just a punch, and a kick, just a kick. After I learned the art, a punch was no longer a punch, a kick, no longer a kick. […]
Groove o’ the day: Copeland’s cha cha
Keith, not Stewart. Here’s a groove I’ve gotten some use out of recently while subbing with Pepe & The Bottle Blondes, a Portland salsa/swing group, for my man Ken Ollis. It’s a unique form of […]
DBMITW: Jon Christensen is great
Jon Christensen, on Ralph Towner’s Solstice: Maybe it’s not a perfect analogue, but I think of him as the Billy Higgins of the fusion era– an egoless (in his playing, at least!), perfectly musical drummer. […]
Double time feel / half time feel
Hm, maybe being extraordinarily busy will force me to finally do some things that are actually accessible to people. Here’s another easy thing, illustrating half time feel and double time feel using basic rock beats. […]
Other people write things
OK, clearly this light patch is going to continue for a bit, so let’s see what my blogging compatriots are up to: Let’s lead with pianist George Colligan, who has a few words on practicing: […]