Alan Dawson further advice?

Caz

Senior Member
Hey all, was anyone here lucky enough to get one-on-one tuition with Alan Dawson? The book by John Ramsay has helped me to focus my practice time enormously - but I've been working through it religiously for over a year and wondered if there are any more ideas/philosophies that Alan might have taught people which can be worked on alongside the material in the book.

If anyone's based in London and available to give me one or two private lessons please PM. Otherwise, if you don't mind sharing with the masses, I'm sure there are many people on here who are hugely inspired by Dawson who'd love to hear more from what he had to say.

Thanks, Caz.
 
...i'll chime in since no one seems to be responding... i studied with one of alan's students, i don't have first hand knowledge...

1. the methods in the book are only a SAMPLING of alan's teaching. alan's method was all about taking the 8 exercises in the back of syncopation and applying them in different ways. be creative. the exercises reflect the phrasing in jazz melodies and are meant to be heard and understood this way. the exercises can and should be applied to jazz melodies. (long/short etc.) take any jazz tune... straight no chaser, a charlie parker tune etc. and apply the exercises. create your own exercises. alan dawson's method was more about creating exercises to fit melodies than about the exercises themselves. keyword create.

2. improvise, innovate and be creative with the material. be aware that mr. dawson's method, book, students and students of students are coming out of berklee college of music factory style... mr. dawson himself emphasized the importance of being creative with the material. you'll make more money and a greater contribution to the evolution of the human race flipping burgers than you will playing the material "by the book." in other words... make it your own... create your own exercises... have faith in yourself and work hard.

that's all i know
good luck
 
Yes, I am asking the same question too. Anybody??

Claus Hessler has a great section on his recent DVD Drumming Kairos (which comes with a huge pdf of exercises) on what he calls "Reverse Syncopation," which deals with incorporating different rudiments and rhythmic phrases over Syncopation-type phrases; you might want to check that out. I think it's probably similar to what Dawson was talking about. For example, if you took a 4 stroke ruff, you could practice it this way: your basis is continuous 16th notes with alternating strokes. Play this, but every time a 16th note falls on one of the notes of the musical line, replace it with a 32nd note triplet (alternating hands). So the Syncopation measure that goes 1 + (2) + 3 (+) 4 (+) would look something like this:

RLRL RLRL R L RLRL RLRL R L RLRL R L

I hope that makes sense. Claus gives numerous other examples using a variety of rudiments.
 
Claus Hessler has a great section on his recent DVD Drumming Kairos (which comes with a huge pdf of exercises) on what he calls "Reverse Syncopation," which deals with incorporating different rudiments and rhythmic phrases over Syncopation-type phrases; you might want to check that out. I think it's probably similar to what Dawson was talking about. For example, if you took a 4 stroke ruff, you could practice it this way: your basis is continuous 16th notes with alternating strokes. Play this, but every time a 16th note falls on one of the notes of the musical line, replace it with a 32nd note triplet (alternating hands). So the Syncopation measure that goes 1 + (2) + 3 (+) 4 (+) would look something like this:

RLRL RLRL R L RLRL RLRL R L RLRL R L

I hope that makes sense. Claus gives numerous other examples using a variety of rudiments.

Ermm, it kind of makes sense. From what I understand, you basically replace a long note with a rudiment, right?
 
The simplest way to understand the concept is to play double strokes in 1/8 notes at quarter-note =100 - a very slow long roll. While doing that read Syncopation and make the written rhythms of the exercises in Syncopation into accents within the roll.

The first line would be:

RRlLRrLl, RrLlrRlL, RrLlRRlL, RRlLRrll

Next do it with the paradiddle sticking:

RLrRLrLl, RlRrlRlL, RlRrLRlL, RLrRLrll

Hope this helps,

John Riley
 
The simplest way to understand the concept is to play double strokes in 1/8 notes at quarter-note =100 - a very slow long roll. While doing that read Syncopation and make the written rhythms of the exercises in Syncopation into accents within the roll.

The first line would be:

RRlLRrLl, RrLlrRlL, RrLlRRlL, RRlLRrll

Next do it with the paradiddle sticking:

RLrRLrLl, RlRrlRlL, RlRrLRlL, RLrRLrll

Hope this helps,

John Riley

Wow, thanks Mr. Riley. Ok, I get the concept for singles and paradiddles. Could you give me an example using a rudiment like a ratamacue?
 
Wow, thanks Mr. Riley. Ok, I get the concept for singles and paradiddles. Could you give me an example using a rudiment like a ratamacue?

Play longer notes as ratamacues and eighth notes as ruffs. You'll end up with this sort of stuff:

Screenshot%202013-12-21%2020.00.41.png


Original rhythm below.
 
Ermm, it kind of makes sense. From what I understand, you basically replace a long note with a rudiment, right?

Well, in the example I gave you actually replace EVERY note--short and long--with the rudiment. Sorry I can't put it in notation; I realize it's hard to convey with just a string of R's and L's.
 
Hey all, was anyone here lucky enough to get one-on-one tuition with Alan Dawson? The book by John Ramsay has helped me to focus my practice time enormously - but I've been working through it religiously for over a year and wondered if there are any more ideas/philosophies that Alan might have taught people which can be worked on alongside the material in the book.

If anyone's based in London and available to give me one or two private lessons please PM. Otherwise, if you don't mind sharing with the masses, I'm sure there are many people on here who are hugely inspired by Dawson who'd love to hear more from what he had to say.

Thanks, Caz.

It's really cool that John Riley chimed in. You can take pretty much anything he says to the bank.

So here's my next long post.

I was fortunate enough to study with Alan for 10 months, from 1982-83. Now, I wasn't really prepared for the intensity of the experience but many of his teachings have stuck with me to this day. The most important things were time management and balancing technique with musicianship. He would quickly gauge your skill level and give you challenging but appropriate material. If you did your homework, the following lesson would be a breeze. If you didn't, it was excruciatingly painful. It's not that he would yell, but his demeanor would change and you'd feel physically ill. Like crawling away into a hole to die. But there'd be a glimmer of hope that you could make it up for the next lesson. Each lesson was a new start because he never carried over any ill will. There are scores of drummers out there who are more advanced and studied with him longer. Still, I believe he wanted to make sure his message got through to all of his students. And his approach certainly helped me as I studied with other challenging teachers.

Some things he told me:

"First impressions are lasting." When I glossed over the Ted Reed part of my first lesson. He normally wouldn't spoon feed you. You got a lesson with rudiments, Stick Control, reading and a song form exercise. When he saw my frustration with the Ted Reed section he suggested that I practice some of the earlier, repetitive exercises in the book if I were truly stuck. But was meant as the reading portion of the lesson.

"This is a performance." When I stopped playing after making a mistake and restarted. He wanted you to play through a lesson as if you were on stage. If you make a mistake, take a mental note of it and work on it later, but not at that time.

"Why not put one or two hours of this material first and then do your thing?" After I told him I fool around on the set and then work on my lessons.

"Monk was weird, but he had perfect time" Another time, after I said I wanted to do my own approach to drums. The implication was 'learn form and the nuts and bolts of music first, then do your own thing'. He had played with Monk in NY and was open to any type of approach, so long as it was rooted in good mechanics and was musical.

"I see what you're doing- you're 'leaning on the beat'." Leaning on the beat might be a paraphrase but that's essentially what he said; basically I was chasing the metronome with one of his Stick Control warmups. He had this loud Franz metronome that was plugged in. My timing was unsteady and I'd rush and drag in between beats but always tried to end on the beat.

"The pad is a supplement, not a substitute for the drum."

I spent an unbalanced amount of time on technique, so he tried to steer me in a more musical direction. For what it's worth, now days in Pipe Band, I always sing the melody while practicing. Now it's second nature. But in front of him, it was quite awkward. If I could only go back in time...

At any rate, here are some technique things I remember.

He would give 3 rudiments to practice for the next lesson. You had to play them as a traditional breakdown, from slow-to fast to slow. I never had a problem with getting my hands around any of them, but I had a tendency to rush. When it came to paradiddle rudiments with flams, drags and 4 stroke ruffs attached, I would occasionally ram through them. So he played a paradiddle up to speed followed by a flam paradiddle, then a drag paradiddle then a 4 stroke ruff paradiddlediddle on my leg! He wanted you to feel the full note value and even though embellishments didn't add to the note value, there had to be a certain spacing between them.

Double stroke roll breakdown. Most people play them starting out slow and loud. As they pick up speed it gets quieter until it purrs along at top speed. As the tempo winds down, the volume tends to pick up. Alan had you practice it the opposite: Start out slow and quiet. At your top speed it's fff. then you bring it back down to ppp.

Drags (or 3 stroke ruffs). Using traditional grip, with the left hand, you would drag your forefinger on top of the stick to get two, quick double grace notes. In the right hand, you'd pull back with your fingers the same way. In traditional rudimental breakdowns, drag grace notes would start out space far apart and get closer as the tempo increased. Alan had you play them quick and close together next to the main note. That spacing was constant regardless of the tempo.

Whether it was Stick Control or rudiments, it was never just hands. You always had to keep time on the bass drum (or floor) and with the hi-hat on 2 & 4.

Timing was non-negotiable to him. As was song form.
 
I agree with much of what JohnW said. I had the opportunity to study with Alan for around 2 years back in 80/81. Typically in my lessons, we would cover 4 different areas of playing involving both technique and musicality. We would start of on the drum pad. At first, like JohnW mentioned, Alan would give you 3 different rudiments to work on during the week. He would tell you to play them slow to fast. The order of the rudiments was in the same order of the rudimental ritual. After a lot of weeks of study, you had made it all the way through playing 3 rudiments each week from slow to fast and tackled all the rudiments in the ritual, he would give you a print out of the rudimental ritual. (more on this later).

He would also have you play to Stick control, after each 4 bars written in the book, you would play 4 rights, then 4 lefts, then you would play the next exercise. When you got to the bottom of the page, you would play the column again, playing 8 rights and then 8 lefts after each exercise, Continue this with 12 and then 16 rights and lefts.

The third thing he used to have his students do at the pad was to play single stroke 32nd notes for 60 counts. Each stoke had to be at the same volume without accents. Of course there was a tendency slightly accent the downbeat to keep up with the aforementioned metronome. It was about control and Alan listened carefully for any inconsistences in dynamics or tempo. Of course if you only play 59 beats or 61 beats, he knew. You needed to perfect that setting on the metronome before he would tell you to turn if up a notch. Prior to stopping my lessons with Alan, I ask him once how fast should I be able to play this. At the time I was playing the 60 counts at around 106; (Alan played them at around 112), he said the fastest any of his students were ever able to play them was 116. Now there’s a goal for you! Again, in control.

There was a point when I’d move to the drum set for the lesson that Alan would have me play the rudimental ritual on the snare drum at the kit with brushes while playing a bossa/samba type foot ostinato. I don’t really remember how long I did that for. There was a point in my lessons were we would start with the rudimental ritual but playing it together on the pad. That was fun see how tight I could get playing though it with Alan. I have to admit after a while, it was pretty good.

At the drum set, you would whatever exercise he would give you from the Reed book, pages 33 – 41 (the pages have changed over the years). You weren’t sure what page Alan would ask you to play, so you really had to work all of them up. And JohnW’s right, the expectation was that you would play through the whole page without stopping, regardless of whether you made a mistake or not. Of course it you did make a mistake, you would be spending the next week working on the same material.

The last section of the lesson was soloing over a song form. Alan would have me pick a standard (we all had Real books) and play singing the melody 3 times. The first you would play time, the second you would solo and the third you would play time. Alan told me “thank goodness you’re not here trying to be singer”. Now and then, Alan would play vibes and I would play drums. Seemed like that wasn’t a regular part of the lesson but was fun none the less.

Alan would have a way to make you want excel. I think the biggest lesson I learned from Alan was everything else around drumming, ie being professional. Being prepared, showing up on time, “be happening”. It’s lessons I’ve used in in my non drumming career over the last 30 years (IT developer). The lessons meant a lot to me, after all these years I keep all the little 5 X 7 sheets of paper with his name address and phone number printed on the top. He would hand write you lesson for the weeks and give you that paper. I kept them in like sized notebook for the last 35 years. The things we keep
 
Spectacular contributions here from JohnW and mainframe. Thanks so much for sharing, guys!

I have an old internet friend who studied with Alan and was kind enough to share with me some personal recordings he had of the man. You cats are extremely fortunate to have studied with such a legendary player and teacher.
 
WhoIsTony & 8Mile: You guys would have shined with him!

And mainframe_wa: You were especially fortunate. I never got to the point where Alan would play vibes with me, although now and again, I'd hear him do it with one of the students before me.

Was he an avid cyclist when you studied with him? When I was there, he would go out riding during the occasional schedule gap. If he had a lesson going on, you could go into his waiting area just inside the door and warm up on a pad mounted on a tripod. But a number of times I'd get there early and his basement door would be closed, with a "Will Return" clock sign hanging up. When he came back, he'd bring his bike in (with a sheepskin covered seat), take his gear off, put some lotion on his hands and get right down to teaching. I'm not sure how much cycling helps with drumming, but there is a certain parallel with the mechanics of the whole thing. At one point, he talked about "shifting gears" while I was struggling with an exercise; possibly a transition from 16th notes to eighth note triplets. It was supposed to be seamless and confident, not a settling in process.
 
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