Solo - left hand?? help

[heythere]

Hi! Don't mind my english I'm from Denmark! :)

I've never understood how to make my solos/fills sound "bigger", by incorporating my left hand like Dave Weckl does alot. What is it you do? I mean when your doing a fill and you go to your toms and you keep playing your snare at the same time - like rolls??
Hope you're able to understand what I'm talking about... :)

I wanna be able to do this so there are more going on when I'm doing a fill or soloing, otherwise it sound so boring! I want it to sound bigger, more fluidly!

What technique are we talking about? - is it moeller?? Any exercises you would recommend for this particular way of playing?

thank you! - Jonas

[Joe P]

You can do something like RLL triplets, with the right hand moving around the toms and the left hand staying on the snare. Also throw in some RRLL doubles with the triplets to keep it interesting :P

[Wavelength]

I think you'll like the concept of the "right hand lead" -- you play most of the accents (on toms, cymbals and snare) with the right hand and fill the gaps with left (and right, if necessary) hand ghost notes on the snare. The whole thing can be dissected into different combinations of RL, RLL, RLRL, RLRRL, RLRRLL etc... Two consecutive accents are played with alternating hands: LRLL or RLRL. Needless to say, that working on your Paradiddles, Paradiddle-diddles, Double Paradiddles -- what have you -- is very beneficial.

This method complements beautifully the "regular" way of playing alternating singles throughout, and you should strive to use them both in a smooth, flowing fashion.

[Dibalo Jonze]

Not sure what exactly your looking but hopefully this one tip will help. There are many ways to develop fills and get a bigger sound and most will come with time and practice.

When I think of Weckl's fills (amongst other things) I think about how he will do a long fill that extends more than a quarter note, more than a measure even, sometimes practically throughout the whole song. But we know fills have to be second to keeping a groove. So to me the two most important things to do while doing a fill in most 4/4 settings is to keep the tempo steady and KEEP PLAYING THE BACKBEAT.

So if your playing a simple 2 & 4, and at the end of the verse want to do a long fill down the toms using 1/16 notes, go ahead but make sure your hand is always coming back to the snare on 2 & 4. In fact, try doing a constant single roll solo all over the drums using all possible sound sources while always playing 1 & 3 on bass and 2& 4 on snare. Make sure to change sound sources, play with dynamics, and use other rudiments besides just single strokes. Just keep your hands moving but keep the tempo consistent and always play the backbeat. That should be good practice for incorporating bigger fills wherever you please.