20 Minute Drum Practise Session – Part Two

Graham — Sat, 06 May 2006 13:05:02 +0000

Sometimes, when you only have 20 minutes spare to play drums and the last thing you want to do is practise rudiments, such as the ones I listed in Part One, you feel like playing along to some songs instead. I have specifically created a CD for my practise needs and the first six songs on the CD are songs that are challenging yet offer you fun when playing them. At the risk of getting flamed, here are those six songs:

Toto – Hold The Line – Drummer: Jeff Porcaro
Stone Temple Pilots – Plush – Drummer: Erik Kretz
Buckcherry – Next 2 You – Drummer: Xavier Muriel
The Best Thing – Boom Crash Opera – Drummer: Peter Maslen
Beyonce – Crazy In Love – Drummer: Gerald Heyward
Jamie Cullum – Singin’ In The Rain – Drummer: Sebastiaan de Krom

So you can see, they are a fairly varied bunch of songs covering a couple of popular music styles. I wonder what six songs everyone else practises to?

20 Minute Drum Practise Session – Part One

Graham — Fri, 21 Apr 2006 13:46:20 +0000

If I only have a small amount of time to practise drums, and I don’t want to practise a particular song, this is the program that I follow. This is also an excellent warm up before a gig. I hope it helps some of the other drummers out there.

Single Hand Four Stroke Roll

This little exercise is great for limbering up the forearm muscles. It’s also a great practice exercise for developing arm and hand strength and speed! The idea is simple: play quarter notes only with the right hand. When you have finished with the right hand, move to the left hand. When you have finished with the left, go back to the right. Do three reps of this (the second and third rep can be just at your fastest speed, not speeding up and slowing down).

Paradiddle

It’s our old friend the Paradiddle. The object of this one is to maintain a consistent tempo through the various speeds. Again, start slow, then speed up; first leading with the right, then with the left. Do three reps.

Triplet

With triplets, each quarter note gets three beats, instead of just one

Flams

A flam variant that works through those little, fast, intricate doublets and triplets. Work at a steady speed.

Double Stroke Roll

Start this one slow and work up to speed, hold, then slow down. Pause for a minute, then repeat. Three reps.

Accents

Example one will help with dynamics while working on doubles and triples. Work through it as previous routines. The second example is the Paradiddle but with accented strokes on the ONE.

Example One

Example Two

Paradiddle Rhythm

In Rhythm 1, the paradiddle is played between the snare and the bass drum. This is probably the simplest application. “Pattern 1″ above starts the paradiddle with the snare; “Pattern 2″ starts it with the feet.

In Part Two I mention the songs I like to practise if I only have 20 minutes to play and I don’t feel like doing these rudiment excerises.

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20 Minute Drum Practise Session – Part Two

20 Minute Drum Practise Session – Part One