Here’s a rare bone for my younger/beginning-er readers. What we have here is a collection of basic “rock” beats- really they’re good for many/most varieties of popular music using the drum set. The names I’ve […]
Waterloo bullet
All right, people, we are going to be on really, truly, unconscionably light posting through most of the next week as I do my taxes, get it together for, and then go play the Ballard […]
Tom moves
This Elvin thing is turning into a real epic– well, a very small epic, maybe, if you think about it- and I still have to complete the transcription. Here are the tom moves I would […]
Developing Elvin’s Afro-Waltz
Here’s a little something for developing the left hand using the feet-and-cymbal part from Elvin Jones’ groove on John Coltrane’s Your Lady. I always did that type of thing by just going for the sound […]
My new CD is out now
Oh, hey, my new Origin Records CD of obscure tunes by Ornette Coleman, LITTLE PLAYED LITTLE BIRD, is out now and starting to get some radio play. It features my same smoking tenor player from […]
Todd’s methods: triplet funk with Reed, pt. 2
In case you were playing through part 1 and wondering what the big deal is, here’s the actual thing. It looks complicated because there’s a lot of ink on the page, but each step of […]
More Reggae lead-ins
Here’s a nice companion for my transcription of Sly Dunbar intros from his recordings with Serge Gainsbourg. These are some drum lead-ins from a weird little record by a 70’s London group called Creation Rebel, […]
How much to practice something
1. Get wood chisel. 2. Remove everything that doesn’t look like Billy the Kid deftly gunning down Bat Masterson before the throng of stunned onlookers, a yapping yellow hound at his feet. 3. SUCCESS! One […]
Typos in Funky Primer
Time to get out your white-out again. This is something that had been bugging me for many years of working with A Funky Primer, by my old professor, Charles Dowd. Most of the book consists […]