Concentration Question

Yep, if I recall the example they used is from a drum clinic (of maybe Copeland?). he played the money beat 3 mins straight...suggesting how few drummers could or would choose to do it (without temptation to embellish it here or there) . Dunno ,maybe it was another example.

Ever since I read that, I try it occasionally, and for me it is very hard to hold steady and not embellish even a little bit.

Here's my kid playing nothing but groove. 5m30s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygVlz1q-hEI
 
If that's the case, you might want to check out some live albums featuring Al Jackson, Jr.'s drumming (I look for any opportunity to talk about this stuff). Here are some of them (all of them except the last one are from that same Stax/Volt tour):

Otis Redding - Live in Europe (my favorite live album of all time)
The Stax Volt Revue vol. 1 - Live in London
The Stax Volt Revue vol. 2 - Live in Paris
The Stax Volt Revue vol. 3 - Hit the Road Stax
Booker T. and the MGs/The Mar-Keys - Back to Back
Funky Broadway: Stax Volt Revue Live at the 5/4 Ballroom

An interesting studio album that contains a little bit busier drumming from Al is Isaac Hayes' debut album, Presenting Isaac Hayes. It's really just a loose jam album, with just Isaac on piano and vocals, Al on drums, and Duck Dunn on bass. It was apparently recorded late at night after the Stax Christmas Party, when the musicians were a little (or perhaps a lot) inebriated. Al Bell (the Stax vice president) had been trying to talk Hayes into recording an album under his own name, and Hayes had been reluctant, but after having a few drinks on that night, he was game, so Bell seized the moment and headed down to the studio with them. The results are unrehearsed and unpolished, but you do get to hear Al in a looser studio setting than normal. Here's the title cut (Hayes apparently hadn't gotten around to writing the lyrics yet, so he just sort of moans the melody throughout it): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSIfqXmiyBY

Eddie thanks for this I'm going to wade into this stuff today!

There's plenty of songs that feature and call for extremely simple drum progressions.

We can all say it's boring, or it needs more... But here's the thing. Doing it the simplistic way and making it sound good is harder than just embellishing or making it sound good by adding to the groove.

Someone here a while back posted something about how hard it is to just play the money beat, on your own, for 5 full minutes and really make it sound good without adding fills, flair or anything really. This is a huge skill to have in the toolbox, regardless how often you end up playing the same thing for 5 min in your drumming career.

Of course I agree, but then there comes a point where the subjectivity of music means that personally sometimes you just want to hear what you want to hear. And in the context of this song I much prefer the live version.

Also the OP is jamming with people for the first time, I say there is nothing wrong with him experimenting and having a little fun with the tune. If they play it through three times in a rehearsal he could do two straight and one embellished. Playing has to be fun for him when it comes down to it.

Yep, if I recall the example they used is from a drum clinic (of maybe Copeland?). he played the money beat 3 mins straight...suggesting how few drummers could or would choose to do it (without temptation to embellish it here or there) . Dunno ,maybe it was another example.

Ever since I read that, I try it occasionally, and for me it is very hard to hold steady and not embellish even a little bit.

Are you allowed a couple of ghost notes here or there? just one? two? please!!!!
 
THAT was just what I needed to hear.... Side Note - Has there EVER been a whiter audience ever? They almost look like they are scared!

If you get your bass player to bob his weave like Duck Dunn then you know you are doing it right. Man, I just love that band. They seemed to always be enjoying playing the music so much, just loving hearing each other. Clearly they are not playing for (I mean getting anything from) the audience, but they play like champions for their own sake anyway. They are such good role models. Incidentally, I am always trying to get my band to jam Green Onions at sound check, and they only rarely go for it.

I always felt that song is an ideal lively tempo for practicing quietly ghost shuffling the snare between the back beats while keeping straight fours on the cymbal. That's taken me years to develop so that it feels great. That's plenty to work on and I never get tired of hearing it when it's done well. There are so many nuances you can play with: dynamics on the snare, more or less legato in the shuffle, variations of hand technique and flow. And yes, forgetting about all that thinking altogether and just sinking into the trance, listening intently to what everyone else is playing and enjoying.

Maybe someone said something like this before, but I feel like one of the gateways into that trance state for me is listening deeply to the other musician's sense of time. I have been playing for decades but I feel like I keep sinking Into deeper and deeper levels of awareness of that than I ever had before. That keeps me very engaged.
 
I've gotten pretty good at this. It is a challenge if you're accustomed to filling up drum parts with a lot of notes.

The way I like to think about it is being really conscious about where the beat is and how the drums relate to the other instruments. Just concentrating at an almost hypnotic level. It keeps your mind engaged and you won't drift off.

Also, you SHOULD be concentrating on the groove and where the beat falls, all the time. So it's useful for everything else you play, too, to develop that skill.
 
It's about maintaining "the chant".

Also, here's a great way to describe what it is we do. Think about carrying a glass of liquid across a room without spilling any of it. If you're staring at it chances are you'll make a mess. That's how to play a beat.

Playing in front of people is like having a bucket of water balanced on your head. If you screw up too bad you'll end up getting wet. :D

So when you play a song in a band with others on a stage in a crowd, it's like carrying that liquid in your hand and the bucket of water on your head up a set of stairs, down the stairs, through the busy center of the restaurant with others bumping into you... all the while not spilling anything.

:D

Wow, these are great analogies! I'm so gonna use these :D
 
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