How did you start getting "loose" on difficult fills?

If you mean getting comfortable, that's just a matter of the familiarity and interdependence that comes with practice. The only 'technique' I know of is to do something over and over until it sounds and feels good.

Bermuda
 
Lots of practice with sub-divisions and a steady sense of time.

Practicing specific fills over and over is stupid and for the most part makes you only good at those fills.

Practicing your placement of all the different ways to sub-divide the beat will get you ready for any fill you might want to play.
 
Listen to lots and lots of music. Don't just hear the music. Listen very hard and deep.

Then someday when you are playing a song, drum fills will come into your mind.
You will feel what fits where. You will begin creating parts using pieces of what you have heard.


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That's a wide description and means different things to different people.

It's do, not did.

Really, no matter what I practice it's about an end result, how I wan to sound and the reasons for developing specific exercises is when something in there doesn't flow. It's almost all like that now, because there's little reason to do the rest, which of course is important before you get to that point. Still working on basics, just work it in a different way.
 
The only 'technique' I know of is to do something over and over until it sounds and feels good.

This is/was definitely part of getting comfortable with fills for me -- just doing basic fills over and over, and combining short fills into longer ones. But I also had some great lessons on improvising fills around the kit, that really opened up that concept for me. I do it with students all the time: play 3 measures of a beat, then improv a 1-measure fill. The trick is, if you tell a student to just create any fill, there are just too many possibilities. You have to place some limits on how the fills can be created/improv'd, so that you're not overwhelmed with choice.

But of course, learning to improvise fills involves practicing over and over as well. It's just that there isn't *one* specific fill to practice; there's a somewhat limited *way* of creating many fills at hand. But as you go along, you'll require fewer limits.
 
I'm just wondering out of curiosity. For me, was the understanding of rudiments as well as displacement + subdivision. Have a lot to still develop but would like to know how did you guys do it.

Not sure I understand the question. But my process has always been just that: putting in the time over years of playing. There is no magic bullet that will get you there other than you sitting at the instrument and doing. If you also sit and do at the instrument with other musicians simultaneously that’s even better.
 
I avoid difficult fills in favor of groove, 100% of the time. Difficult fills aren't at the bottom of the list for me, they're not even on the list.

Getting loose on difficult fills...Firstly the basics have to be well in control before difficult fills are attempted. Imagine a 1 year old wanting to learn advanced gymnastics when they can barely walk. So it's a progression. Like I don't simply appear in California. I have to fly over 48 states first. Same thing.
 
Maybe Veecharlie means "Loose" like relaxed in demeanor. When you have to cover a fill exactly I always get nervous about it-it isn't playing it, it can be simple, just it isn't my own and I have to learn it (rather than create it) and I feel like the "pressure is on"-it's psychological. Otherwise I'll make up my own fill which I'm loose as a goose. But, like Larry, I'm not a fill guy, I almost wonder why I have toms, and, it seems like, when I cover fills I hardly ever use more than two toms (So I quit carrying 3 and use 2). But I like what you said Larry-your goal is groove-for me it's more accents on toms (especially 16 floor) or "microfills" but I try to get my groove thing on too. I get these psychological blocks-I'm conscious of it but seem helpless-I was doing the snare part of Bolero in an orchestra-I had it down-suddenly the conductors is jabbering away, per usual to an audience during a performance,I usually don't pay that close attention to him jabbering but suddenly he mentions the repetitive snare part and for people to listen-well F. me, started fine but then suddenly I realized I was off on another planet and wasn't sure where I was in the right part or not-everything looked fine with other musicians and conductor when I returned from Mars or Uranus, but I wasn't sure-fortunately my wife was in it too and she said I was fine-but man I was gone for part of the song. Like my fight or flight got turned on-I was going to flight but I sucker punched me in fight and knocked myself out for a bit LOL. If a song starts with this big cover fill, that is the worse for me, my heart is racing 90 to nothing and I have to force myself to calm down dude-Get Agrip-pa! See it's a fitting moniker-I say that a lot to myself.
 
..Listen to lots and lots of music. Don't just hear the music. Listen very hard and deep..

..Start slow, be patient, and get enough sleep (sleep helps with muscle memory and just memory in general)..


With these 2 things a lot of things in a (musician's) life will be set..


Regarding (difficult) fills..

They are sometimes nice to learn/study and that process will never hurt someones playing..

That being said, i think is important to realise that playing difficult fills within the majority of lets say 'popular music', rarely adds something musical and in most cases is just a way to impress fellow musicians a little..For the avarage listener in the audience a fast single stroke 16th note fill during a few bars from tom-1 to tom-4, is just as impressive as any 'difficult' fill..

Powerfull fills in my opinion are fills that really say something..

Like for example in this one..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLYqTZKEpvs
 
I tend to agree with Larry’s advice though. Groove and time are infinitely more important than complicated fills. Look at Charlie Watts - among a lot of others - that mainly play solid time. Even people known for really flashy chops acknowledge groove is where it’s at. When I started working a lot I noticed I over-trained myself for fills and solos, and my groove sucked. I had to turn that around as soon as possible!
 
Blah, blah, blah I still think the OP is talking about psychologically being loose playing fills -like golf has a psychological component-ask Tiger. Drums too-you can play something great but still struggle with it and tense up. We are often our worse enemy. It's interesting we have to be in time and groove-but a fill can be blank, it can speed up or slow down the time for that space, it can linear, syncopated, it can be played on one drum or cymbal-just as long as you end the fill in time. Jazz cats always blow me away with solos (which are a macrofill-yep I'm making up new words microfills, fills, and macrofill-I should write a book selling this manure) and come out in time. Hmmmm is a solo just an extended "fill"-often a transition and it is filling a space. a macrofill? No my Mom didn't drop me on my head at birth-maybe???? LOL.
 
Looseness isn't reserved for difficult fills. I'd say that a players overall level of looseness is fairly constant throughout a performance. Like if I play tightly during the keeping time part, most likely I will play tight during any fills as well.

The reverse would also apply.

For me it was a psychological wall I scaled where I had to let go of all the tension. I have to play lightly most of the time, so I had to basically "try less" for me to sound relaxed. I always thought I had to work as hard as I can. Ha ha. That was before I became comfortable with musical time. After I became comfortable with time, (via metronome work) everything just kinda fell into place, relaxation-wise.

I was not happy with my playing, until I was able to play completely relaxed.

So being able to play loosely....first I have to actually feel loose. Not uptight, like at all dog. It's born out of confidence...knowing what I'm good at, knowing my role in the band, knowing what NOT to do, and being comfy with musical time, even amidst chaos.

Another tip to play loosely is the concept of headroom. A loose feeling player is operating at (guessing) 60% capacity, as opposed to operating right at the top limits of their playing. The closer I get to my top limit, the tighter my playing sounds.

So headroom.
 
That's a wide description and means different things to different people.

It's do, not did.

Really, no matter what I practice it's about an end result, how I wan to sound and the reasons for developing specific exercises is when something in there doesn't flow. It's almost all like that now, because there's little reason to do the rest, which of course is important before you get to that point. Still working on basics, just work it in a different way.

I really did mean DID lol. It's not a lesson for me :p I'm just curious because I was in a conversation not so long ago with another drummer (beginner) and this topic came up. We had different answers to the topic and different views, so I was curious to post it here and see what comes up
 
Lots of practice with sub-divisions and a steady sense of time.

Practicing specific fills over and over is stupid and for the most part makes you only good at those fills.

Practicing your placement of all the different ways to sub-divide the beat will get you ready for any fill you might want to play.

defenitively agree. If I want to challenge my creativity on fills, I normally start taking away things from the kit, limiting my options or just start a groove and start experimenting with different things. Can't do that without a kit right now, but from my experience, trying to learn fills they just will never really come to that "occasion" very often so that you use them... I certainly learned concepts, then adapted or got creative with...
 
Not sure I understand the question. But my process has always been just that: putting in the time over years of playing. There is no magic bullet that will get you there other than you sitting at the instrument and doing. If you also sit and do at the instrument with other musicians simultaneously that’s even better.
totally agree!!! I remember asking this same question when I was a kid. This is exactly what my first drum teacher told me lol. More practice and it will come alone...
 
With these 2 things a lot of things in a (musician's) life will be set..


Regarding (difficult) fills..

They are sometimes nice to learn/study and that process will never hurt someones playing..

That being said, i think is important to realise that playing difficult fills within the majority of lets say 'popular music', rarely adds something musical and in most cases is just a way to impress fellow musicians a little..For the avarage listener in the audience a fast single stroke 16th note fill during a few bars from tom-1 to tom-4, is just as impressive as any 'difficult' fill..

Powerfull fills in my opinion are fills that really say something..

Like for example in this one..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLYqTZKEpvs

totally agree. It also depends what music you play... I would never play certain type of fills during a certain type of song/style.
 
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