So far I’ve only encountered some very basic drum fills in the songs I’ve been learning but they’ve still presented somewhat of a challenge to me as a new drummer. One of things that has posed a problem for me is figuring out which hands should hit which drums in the course of a fill. Sometimes I find it easier to use an alternating (RLRL or LRLR) technique and other times it seems easier to use sort of a hybrid technique (RRL or LLR, etc.). For instance, in a sixteenth/sixteenth/eighth fill, I’ve sometimes found it easier to hit the toms RRL as opposed to RLR. In some fills, I’ve found it useful to learn the fill multiple ways and then pick which way sounds best. It’s tempting to choose the method which makes the fill easier to play, but I’ve tried to go with the option that sounds most like the recording. So far, I’ve run into this issue in Don’t Tread On Me and in the fill that leads into the tom outro in Enter Sandman. Learning the rudiments has helped me quite a bit as they cover every conceivable hand pattern and allow you to more easily play the fills in multiple ways.
Well, I’ve finally started working on some rudiments starting of course with the first one: the Single Stroke Roll. As I mentioned in my last post, the Drumming System I ordered presents the 40 rudiments in a very useful fashion, providing you with a video of the rudiment being played on its on, in a beat context, and then as a fill. The Single Stroke Roll is pretty simple so I didn’t have much trouble at all playing the examples. I’m going to continue to work on it for a bit and then move onto the next rudiment: the Single Stroke Four.
I’m working on the outro of My Friend of Misery which has quite a few cool fills in it and I can already see how the Single Stroke Roll can help me play them better…the Single Stroke Four is also in a quite a few places as well so that should be very useful as well. I’m hoping to have the whole song down pretty soon.
Well, I’ve got most of My Friend Of Misery down…the intro, verses, chorus and solo (well sorta). I say “well sorta” because there are a couple of fills at the end of the solo that I haven’t gotten yet. One of them has a double bass roll (?–I’m not exactly sure of the terminology) and without a double bass pedal I’ll have to customize that one a bit. The other one is a series of triplets which I think will just take some practice to get down. I’ve had to rearrange things and customize the fill a bit since I’m lacking a 4th or 5th tom but I’m pretty happy with what I came up with.
However, working on that fill has instilled in me the need to start working on those drum rudiments I’ve been talking about since I started this blog. I’m unsure of the best way to play the triplet fill (i.e. which hands to use when) and I think that the rudiments will help me be able to do what I need to do more effectively. So, tomorrow I’m going to start working on rudiments 1-3…the Drumming System that I recently bought gives you a video demo of the rudiment and then plays it in a beat context and a fill context so I’m going to be making good use of that. I’ll let you know how it goes.
, it's the exact same drum kit that I am teaching myself to play on. Check it out if you want to learn to play drums at home too...it's awesome and Amazon always has the lowest price for it. I did a ton of research before I bought it.