This Max Roach Freedom Suite transcription is like a text book on jazz comping— one method of it, anyway. I’m having my students extract some two and three beat cells from the transcribed excerpts; here […]
Basic drum set coordination – 01 – alternating
A page for teachers, for beginning through intermediate level students. I want them to have total clarity on what it feels like to play all the major limbs, and unisons between limbs, and the basic […]
Keep your pencil sharp
Drawing by Josef Albers Every student was required to have a pencil sharpener and to keep a sharp point on the pencil when drawing. — Rob Roy Kelly on studying art with Josef Albers Reading […]
Max’s rubadub – triplets added
Wow, slow posting in August. This is something more to do with that Max Roach rubadub-like system I’ve been writing about recently. Here I’ve added some filler triplets to the original transcribed phrases I posted before— […]
Hemiola funk series: 2/4 inversions
I wrote this out for some of my younger students, and also as a continued exploration of this hemiola rhythm in funk. It’s very similar to some other things I’ve posted— most of these left […]
Writing tips
First get the leaves off your paper and learn how to hold a pen. Start writing at the UPPER LEFT. Come on. “You have to have a command over the English language or you’re just […]
A balanced attitude about cymbals
Some thoughts on cymbals; sound, quality of instruments, and how that relates to playing music. We want to have nice instruments and get a great sound, but, frankly, it is not all-important. Hopefully here we’ll […]
Idris’s clave
A page of beats based on a snare drum rhythm used a lot by Idris Muhammad. It’s a sort of one-bar clave, an inversion of the rhythm commonly called tresillo, starting on beat 3. I’ve […]
Page o’ coordination: another basic 3:2
UPDATE: pdf download now works Back in Portland after a road trip to northern California… recording drums for a quasi-punk record by my wife and one of her 90s East Village cronies, in a Lions […]
Rock drill
Here’s a rock drumming practice system, that is related to my harmonic coordination improved method, and also this post on developing rock fills. I’ve been using it with students of all ages, and have been […]