Which book first???

Toza

Senior Member
Which book first??? Accents & Rebounds (George L. Stone) or Stick Control for Snare (George L. Stone)????
 
Which book first??? Accents & Rebounds (George L. Stone) or Stick Control for Snare (George L. Stone)????

Stick Control for Snare Drum. Accents and Rebounds was based on ideas tha Stone's student, Joe Morello had for Stick Control. You can work A and R's with Morello's books.
 
If you haven't spent any time with stick control you should definitely use it alone for a few years. Accents and rebounds is designed to be used AFTER all of the patterns in stick control are totally effortless. I think you'll overburden yourself if you work on both at once. Just do stick control A LOT and I'm sure you won't feel lacking in material. You definitely need to throw hundreds of hours at that book.
 
Well, if you've got a decent melon on your shoulders you could just go with Accents and skip Stick Control for a bit. Sure - SC is the "bible" and such - but honestly - Accents works with the "first 13" in SC and those are the really important exercises. After that it's all combinations - for the most part. I mean obviously - it changes up when you have a more familiar response - but everyone else, RLRL combinations can get pretty boring - might as well have some accents to along with them. Things get more exciting.
 
Sort of a related question: Stick Control vs Syncopation, which one first?
 
Both. Stick Control for.... um.... stick control, and Syncopation for general coordination (although Stick Control is great for this as well, though for slightly different reasons).
 
Well I have been playing for 30 years and have tried to make it through stick control a few times. I am proud to say I started it again about a year ago. I am on page 43!

Yes I know you can use it many ways but just to make it through it on the pad for me is a huge accomplishment. I figure another 3 weeks to a month and through it.

I am planning on going to Master Studies next, I hear it is a great book.
 
Stick Control...still a book that I look at at least a few times per week. You can spend years on the first few pages.
 
But seriously - why only one book? I am constantly working out of five or six books.
Why not pick up Master Studies and get to work on that while you "finish up" Stick Control?

So now with the Master Studies series is Stone obsolete? Perhaps. I think this is a good idea though, to do them in tandem. Understanding those patterns in Stick Control is an important first step. You will use them in your drumming. If you have a strong background in rudiments, it may not be as necessary to start with SC . But it does have a lot of offer, especially for the drummer new to technique.
 
So now with the Master Studies series is Stone obsolete?


No. I use all of those books. There are even a few things worth looking at in the Riley books (which I do use). My point with the Riley book/obsolete thing was that a good bulk of them deal with the two-voice/three-voice comping, and there you're learning them almost as "licks" which isn't the way to do it. And Riley even says "they're not meant to be licks" but doesn't really explain for the student how to organically come up with their own stuff...So in that way the Dawson stuff makes all of that obsolete.

Master Studies is a jumping-off point of Stick Control. I find they work very easily together. And also that the Stone Killer exercise is the best exercise I've come across for developing hand speed. It'd be worth it to just open up to those pages if you're going to put Master Studies on hold.
 
No. I use all of those books. There are even a few things worth looking at in the Riley books (which I do use). My point with the Riley book/obsolete thing was that a good bulk of them deal with the two-voice/three-voice comping, and there you're learning them almost as "licks" which isn't the way to do it. And Riley even says "they're not meant to be licks" but doesn't really explain for the student how to organically come up with their own stuff...So in that way the Dawson stuff makes all of that obsolete.

Master Studies is a jumping-off point of Stick Control. I find they work very easily together. And also that the Stone Killer exercise is the best exercise I've come across for developing hand speed. It'd be worth it to just open up to those pages if you're going to put Master Studies on hold.

Actually, the Dawson book works well in tandem with the Riley books, and that's the way John teaches it. What I like about the first Riley book is that it gives the student an understanding of form as well as phrasing, which the beginner might not have. The licks in the second book do come out of recordings, as do Chapin's later melodies. I like to look at how people have used the licks. I'm a bit academic in that sense. But many people say, hey just do your own licks. There is a lot of merit to that.
 
My first book was the Buddy Rich one which I am about halfway through. I started with Stick Control about a month ago. These weren't by choice; they are just the ones teach said I needed to buy.
 
My first book was the Buddy Rich one which I am about halfway through. I started with Stick Control about a month ago. These weren't by choice; they are just the ones teach said I needed to buy.

That's actually the way it should work. You start out with a book that gets you accustomed to the rudiments and then go into Stick Control. This will help you smooth out and strengthen your rudiments. Once your comfortable with that you could start on Master Studies or even Accents and Rebounds.

Here was a good thread where we got into Gladstone Technique, Accents and Rebounds, and Free Stroke.
http://www.drummerworld.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34600&highlight=accents+rebounds
 
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