The Grand Master Buddy Rich

honestly, i cant believe any of this.

to say that buddy rich could not be a great rock player, or latin player, or any player is RIDICULOUS.

i hate to be the one to have to say it, but the majority of rock playing does not demand a great deal of technical facility. the beauty of rock playing, is more in the composition, the way elements work together, etc. bonham, was obviously brilliant in this respect. so is peart, moon, <insert your favourite>

but at the very bottom of the issue is the simple fact that none of this is THAT complicated. you can preach groove all you want and say senseless things that apply only to someone listening strictly to the drums on a track, like "wow the way he displaced a 128th really blew me away" but you cant argue with the fact that..

chops = talent

maybe he didnt practice rock music, and maybe he wasnt the nicest guy. but it is clear to anyone with ears, that buddy rich was more then capable, had enough chops, enough brains to play pretty much anything <inesrt your favourite> did.

play a buddy rich track, and anything else that isnt by some late 90's technical monster, to a non-drummer and see who they think is better.

for instance, i could say portnoy is better then donati for the notes he doesnt play. or he grooves better, or some other overused drum forum lingo. unfortunately, that just wouldn't be true. donati could obviously pound out anything portnoy could play and about 100 times more. and if he doesnt play with restraint, its because he has the talent to do it without sounding stupid. its a cold hard fact of nature.

if you can't agree with it, your giving whichever 70's superstar you prefer too much credit. end of story
 
This argument is really getting a little ridiculous. Buddy's designed techniques are being used today by modern day drummers. It doesn't matter if he layed down a rock groove or not. So much of what we do can be transposed into different roots of music. So he didn't play double bass drums, it doesn't matter. Just look at what today's players are doing and go back and see if Rich was the originator. Give credit where credit is due!

Kruppa is not mentioned by todays crowd, because he was either dead (1973) and not publicized as Rich was or was retired ( prior to 1967). Rich had the advancement of TV and talk shows etc., of which Kruppa did not. Most people you ask today probably were after the Beatles, YardBirds, etc, or were not exposed to big band music by their parents.

As far as Rich not using his third tom or second floor tom, better go revist his solos again. Go check out the Drummerworld stick trick solo under Buddy's video's.
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

this is classic though

can it be done with the matched grip?
can someone please explain?
i'm dying to know
make a video for us
 
Elvin4ever,

That Buddy Rich and John Bonham story is very interesting. Buddy and Zeppelin
actually played on the same bill once! According to Jason, John's son,
John met Buddy at the show. Elaborate more on Buddy's view of Bonham if you can.
I give you total credit for asking Buddy that question. That was probably the best question Buddy was ever asked.

By the way, Cathy (Buddy's daughter) took Buddy to see Zeppelin in 1973.
 
Clark said:
Elvin4ever,

That Buddy Rich and John Bonham story is very interesting. Buddy and Zeppelin
actually played on the same bill once! According to Jason, John's son,
John met Buddy at the show. Elaborate more on Buddy's view of Bonham if you can.
I give you total credit for asking Buddy that question. That was probably the best question Buddy was ever asked.

By the way, Cathy (Buddy's daughter) took Buddy to see Zeppelin in 1973.

Do you know which show?
 
Clark said:
Elvin4ever,

That Buddy Rich and John Bonham story is very interesting. Buddy and Zeppelin
actually played on the same bill once! According to Jason, John's son,
John met Buddy at the show. Elaborate more on Buddy's view of Bonham if you can.
I give you total credit for asking Buddy that question. That was probably the best question Buddy was ever asked.

By the way, Cathy (Buddy's daughter) took Buddy to see Zeppelin in 1973.

Rich was always interested in anyone who was getting attention. But, as one poster already mentioned, Bonham the individual was nowhere near as famous then as he is now.
Yes, Led Zeppelin was a big deal in the 1970s. But in that era the considered headliner virtuoso of that band was Jimmy Page, although Bonham's underground clique was every bit as fervent then as now. Yes, Bonham had his followers. But again I agree with other posts. We thought guys like Carmine Appice were much bigger deals when it came to name recognition.

Bottom line, Rich was irritated if you spoke of any other drummer besides him. He wanted to mention the other guy. But he was aware of Bonham as early as 1970.

With that said, I agree with several others here. Rich could do anything he wanted on the drums, and could play anything that came to his mind, or your mind for that matter.

Look, I really believe too many of our younger colleagues are overly dependant on videos of Rich when making determinations of his greatness. I have never saw a Rich video (including At the Top) that even came close to what he actually sounded like either live or on those rather amazing Pacific Jazz releases, or even his 1939 recordings with Artie Shaw, or his early 1960s work with Harry James.

On the other hand, I also heard Zeppelin several times in the 1970s, and can say with confidence that the Zeppelin DVD going around (that seems to be owned by every 14 to 20 year old drummer on the planet right now) was just about the best I ever heard Bonham in any situation. With these parameters as a yardstick, I suspect it is harder for younger well intentioned and talented drummers to have a higher opinion of Bonham at the expense of the Rich legacy.

Buddy Rich kicked butt for 60 years. You cant make snap judgements about him. His legacy is beyond that.
 
John looked up to Buddy and I've heard John play jazz during an interlude when
Page broke a string. Obviously Zeppelin's music wasn't suited for that kind of drumming
so John played in the most suitable style for the band. He took the Carmine thing and and added his own flair to it.

Buddy and John played on the same bill at Newport Jazz Festival in 1969.

Buddy saw John at Madison Square Garden in 1973.
 
Clark said:
John looked up to Buddy and I've heard John play jazz during an interlude when
Page broke a string. Obviously Zeppelin's music wasn't suited for that kind of drumming
so John played in the most suitable style for the band. He took the Carmine thing and and added his own flair to it.

Buddy and John played on the same bill at Newport Jazz Festival in 1969.

Buddy saw John at Madison Square Garden in 1973.

I'm guessing it was the last night? 1973.07.29?
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

Hi Guys,

Thanks for that small vid' of Knudston, true things get clearer, but anyone have a video on that trick with the traditional grip ?
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

please would you upload your video jammaster
and also find some way of getting to us your jojo mayer solo video, the one in your signature

this putfile thing or whatever you are using will not work for me at all and i really want to see this and the buddy rich stick trick. can i no download it? that's what everyone needs, a download.
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

kjsm said:
please would you upload your video jammaster
and also find some way of getting to us your jojo mayer solo video, the one in your signature

this putfile thing or whatever you are using will not work for me at all and i really want to see this and the buddy rich stick trick. can i no download it? that's what everyone needs, a download.
The push-pull video is not mine it is an online lesson by a drummer whose name I sadly can't remember right now :(
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

HI Jammaster,

Do you think you could get that trad grip push and pull vid' jojo explains it well but he goes too fast
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

Colin, excellent post on the Gladstone technique. That video is great at quickly explaining the open-close technique.

Lof
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

kernond said:
I believe I may be able to help you understand the mechanics of that technique so, here goes...

First, the most important aspect of this technique is the upstroke. Without a strong and fast upstroke you can forget it. You can sort of do it using only your fingers but, you will only be able to play it at a low volume and, you won't have the ability to move the stick to other parts of your kit because you simply won't have the lift that's created by a strong upstroke.

Secondly, timing is extremely important! Every component of the technique has to fall at a very specific point in time. To master this technique you will have to practice slowly at first. You can't just flail the stick around and expect it to eventually just happen.

Let's look at the components and where they have to fall on a rhythmic timeline. Think of the timeline as a one-beat measure of sixteenth-notes counted as "1 e and a".

Note: these instructions are for the matched grip.

Component A is the downstroke (occurs at "1"):
Starting from a STICK UP position, let the stick FALL to the drumhead naturally. Do not push the stick downward. If you do, you will have a very hard time achieving an even sound between the notes. There is no real effort required to do this...let it fall. (You may want to practice this component without sticks by holding your hand in the STICK UP position while maintaining light pressure at the fulcrum. If you are relaxed, you'll notice that the fingers are naturally close to your palms. Now relax the muscles that are holding your wrist up and let the hand fall naturally. Remember to maintain the fulcrum and don't drop your entire forearm. Only your hand should drop, turning at the wrist. I cannot emphasize enough that there is no real effort in this movement. Also note that, IF YOU ARE RELAXED, the wrist will naturally rise a little.)

Component B is the finger-stroke (occurs at "and"):
Okay, the first note has been played and the stick is rebounding. Play the second note using your FINGERS ONLY. There should be no other movements or efforts made. The wrist is at rest and your forearm muscles are relaxed, waiting to explode during the next Component. This relaxed state is extremely important because any tension will stifle the next (and most important) Component. I'm sure by now you realize that we've simply performed a basic Double Stroke. That's all this technique is...a series of Double Strokes. The catch is that you have to remove the time gap between the Doubles. Otherwise, your just playing a shuffle pattern. There is only one thing that can remove this time gap...Upstroke to the Rescue!

Component C is the all-important Upstroke (occurs at "a"):
This is the key to performing this technique and this is where all of the actual work is done. This is where you will make your strongest muscle contraction using the muscles located further up the forearm. The wrist is a hinge. There are muscles around your wrist but, they are used to control the trajectory that the turning wrist will follow. The real workhorse muscles are located up the forearm near the elbow. Think of the hinges on a door. You wouldn't go to open a door by pulling on the hinges would you? Of course not, you would apply force to the opposite end (the door knob) because there is better leverage meaning, less work to achieve the same or greater results. This is important to understand because, when you perform your upstroke, if you focus on pulling up from the wrist area, you will cause tension and that's a good way to go nowhere fast. Having said that, when you perform the upstroke, do it with a strong SNAPPING movement that returns the stick to the UP position. It must be quick and with good form. If you are relaxed and using the correct muscles, the wrist will naturally drop a little.

NOW, those are the components of this technique. Let's zoom out a little to get a bigger picture of what's going on. Looking at where each component falls on our rhythmic timeline, we see that the count is:

"1 - and a"

Extending this to a 4-beat measure we get:

"1 - and a 2 - and a 3 - and a 4 - and a"

That is the timing needed when PRACTICING this technique. Obviously, when playing at faster tempos you don't want to be so mechanical about things. However, at this stage you will have to be this mechanical until it becomes embedded in your mind what happens and when it should happen, rhythmically speaking.


A good exercise to help with the timing of the upstroke is:
Play the technique as described in one hand. In the other hand, play the last sixteenth-note of each beat. There will be hand-to-hand action between the two hands at that last note of each beat because the upstroke in the one hand should happen at the same time as the downstroke in the other hand. This will help you focus on the proper timing of the upstroke. However, as you get faster with this technique, you will probably abandon this exercise because its purpose will have been exhausted. Use this to simply help you with the timing.


Anyway, I hope this helps someone. It's solid information and it is precisely how I learned the technique. Good Luck!

Bah? *head explodes from too much information*
 
Re: The Buddy Rich trick

Hmm...you didn't really expect something like this to be learned in one sitting (or reading) did you? Take it one step at a time. If you don't have very good basic technique then you shouldn't even be thinking about something like this. If you are ready for something like this then give it a good month of practice before you just throw your hands up and walk away from it.

I can't imagine the steps being too much more simplified without leaving out important details. I basically tried to do a brain-dump on the issue. Maybe it will be of use to someone willing to learn something new.

:)
 
Buddy Rich dvds?

Thinkin I'm gonna pick one up. Anyone got a recommendation?
Also, anyone know if there is any footage around the net of Buddy away from the kit ie an interview?
 
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