Rudiments

[itsbettertodieyoung]

As an aspiring rock drummer, do I need to learn all the rudiments? Are there any rudiments I really don't need? Finally, How do I go about learning the rudiments, because some of them, like the double stroke roll, I find really challenging.

[oops]

The long and the short of it is: Yes and No. Do you need rudiments? No, you don't physically need to know how to do a double paradiddle or a Flam Tap.

But you do need the dedication to study them if you're going to make it as a rock drummer, you need the technique which you'll refine if you study them, you'll need the stamina and endurance you'll gain from putting in hours doing single strokes, and you'll need the time and groove you'll get from working with a metronome.

If I was you I'd get a teacher. If not, then work on your single strokes, double strokes and paradiddles. Practice with a metronome from slow to fast tempos at different dynamic levels and work on flowing between them so that no-one can tell the difference when they listen to you.

Hope that helps.

[itsbettertodieyoung]

I forgot to mention that I can't afford a teacher, I'm self taught, so how do I approach rudiments?

[trysthedrummer]

Go here: http://www.vicfirth.com/education/rudiments.html

Get some sticks, get a practice pad, and start slowly with a metronome. If you have no metronome there is one online but you will obviously need to practice near the computer.

http://www.metronomeonline.com/

[Muckster]

I recommend you study all of them and it would be great to master every rudiment. However, if that's not your bag, concentrate on singles, doubles and flams.

[jimmyC]

Hi, Vic Firth has a great section on their website that shows you and let's you hear rudiments. Also, drumrudiments.com is great and includes video to show you many rudiments. There are so many resources out there and a lot of mentors, including wellknown professionals here on this site, that you will have no trouble finding out what and how to practice. The challenge will be how dedicated you are to putting in the time. Also, as you get more experience playing music and trying to express yourself on the kit, you will find that the rudiments are the vocabulary/grammar thet allow you to express your ideas. Beware the person who says "I don't use rudiments". I remember Jim Chapin pointing out that there are great musicians out there that are technically pretty terrible but make the music they play incredible. However, most of us need the basics (like rudiments) to fully contribute to the music we create. Make the rudiments like a game, a challange, you can do it, you'll find the ones that are most useful to you and the one's that help you discover your own style.

Good luck.

[BillBachman]

Hey, rudiments are extremely important. That's the vocabulary of drumming that teaches your hands the motions necessary to play things, whether it be hands together as the rudiment or an individual hand playing any old thing. If you know the 26 you'll be in good shape because all of the necessary hand motions are in those, other hybrids are just more rudiments requiring more coordination, but not anymore hand motions.

[MattRitter]

Originally Posted by BillBachman

Hey, rudiments are extremely important. That's the vocabulary of drumming that teaches your hands the motons necessary to play things, whether it be hands together as the rudiment or an individual hand playing any old thing. If you know the 26 you'll be in good shape because all of the necessary hand motions are in those, other hybrids are just more rudiments requiring more coordination, but not anymore hand motions.

Hey, Bill. Glad to see you're getting involved in our forum here. We have some great discussions. I've really enjoyed your DVD's, and I would be very interested to see a clinic of yours if you're ever in the NY area. I'll keep my eye on your website calendar.

[BillBachman]

Thanks Matt, I'm glad that you like my DVDs. There are actually 10 rudiments which contain all the hand motions you'll ever need, those are the ones covered in Rudimental Beats.

I'd love to do a clinic in NY, we'll see if somebody sets something up!

be well, Bill

[Terry Branam]

Hey Bill,

How are you man? Long time no see!

Everybody listen to what Bill has to say regarding technique. He taught me everything I know. He is the guru of the fulcrum!

Terry Branam

[BillBachman]

Thanks Terry! Good to see you too and congrats on all the published transcriptions and such I've been seeing lately. You definitely have a gift.

Stop by Nashville sometime!

[Alex Luce]

Originally Posted by BillBachman

...There are actually 10 rudiments which contain all the hand motions you'll ever need, those are the ones covered in Rudimental Beats...

Hi Bill: I don't have Rudimental Beats, but I've also noticed drummers don't necessarily need to learn all the rudiments, but can just focus on the patterns that produce different types of hand and arm movements.

Regards,

Alex

[anp27]

I think learning the rudiments is essential, but it's definitely not for everyone. One of my New Year's resolutions was to learn all 40 rudiments, and the way I approached learning them was by going to the Vic Firth rudiments site. I like the 'chart your progress' feature.. it really motivates you to start practicing! I've started keeping a journal to chart my progress, and I'm taking them one 'quadrant' (the 40 rudiments are divided into 4 'quadrants' that you can download) at a time.
I've been so inspired about music and drumming again ever since I started reading Kenny Werner's book called 'Effortless Mastery'. It really opened my eyes about certain aspects musicians face nowadays and how to cope with them. I approach practicing in a whole new way now.... I used to always focus on the end result of practicing, which led me to become impatient and 'skip over' certain things. Now, I'm learning to really enjoy the moment.. to enjoy the art of practicing. I used to think that practicing/learning all 40 rudiments wasn't necessary, but I have a totally different view on rudiments now. I love drumming so much that I want to experience the WHOLE SPECTRUM. It seems that the rudiments are an integral part of drumming so I owe it to myself to learn them, all 40 of them. After I get comfortable with them, I'm going to try to repeat the whole process of learning all 40, only this time, playing them with my feet!

[Ian Ballard]

Originally Posted by itsbettertodieyoung

As an aspiring rock drummer, do I need to learn all the rudiments? Are there any rudiments I really don't need? Finally, How do I go about learning the rudiments, because some of them, like the double stroke roll, I find really challenging.

All rudiments are based on four "primary" elements: Air, Fire, Water and Earth.. haha..just kidding. It would be: Singles, Doubles, Flams and "press" or "buzz" strokes. I would highly recommend focusing on these things; good single-stroke rolls, quality double-stroke rolls, flams and it's a good idea to develop a press roll, but it's not essential for rock playing.

Learning all 26 rudiments is great, but it's going to be insurmountable without a strong fundamental education (either autodidactic or with a teacher) in the singles, doubles and flams. I'd say start there before worrying about being a rudimental master. Dave Grohl, while untaught, plays great singles and flams. I'm not sure if he can play "rolls", but he is a great example of an effective, powerful and competent rock drummer who uses a modicum of rudimental ideas.

The best drumming, in my opinion, focuses on the simple things, and uses up all the possibilities before messing with "hard" stuff.

[TheFatMan]

Originally Posted by BillBachman

Thanks Matt, I'm glad that you like my DVDs. There are actually 10 rudiments which contain all the hand motions you'll ever need, those are the ones covered in Rudimental Beats.

I'd love to do a clinic in NY, we'll see if somebody sets something up!

be well, Bill

Which 10 rudiments cover all the hand motions?

[Bigwheel]

Rather than tell you yes or no let me tell you what practically rudiments have done for me. I take a rudiment and learn it on the snare or pad. Once I have that rudiment clean at multiple tempos I take it to the kit and play it using different voices (drums, cymbals, bells, etc) without accents. For example a paradiddle (RLRRLRLL) using the right hand on the ride and left on the snare then move each hand around. Once I'm comfortable doing that I add accents. Add my bass foot on 1 & 3 and you have a groove started. Get creative and it becomes a blast to practice rudiments. I do this with every rudiment and when I get bored I change to left hand leads which can get interesting. I cannot tell you how many new grooves I've come up with playing rudiments that I would not have found any other way. Oh yea and it's great for independence.

[BillBachman]

Originally Posted by TheFatMan

Which 10 rudiments cover all the hand motions?

The ten key ones that contain all the necessary hand motions are single stroke roll, double stroke roll, triple stroke roll, paradiddle, six stroke roll, flam, flam accent, flam tap, inverted flam tap & drag. Of course you have to be able to play these at all tempos since different tempos require different techniques to play them. You also have to work out quality buzz strokes, but they mostly require experimentation with pressure into the drum where the others are much more difficult.

If you can play those ten well then there are no other rudiments that will require anything more than working out the coordination (which is the easy part).

[dea]

If you want to master the drums you need the rudiments. Rudiments can be incorporated into every aspect of your playing in a tasteful way. Every beat I play has rudiments in them in some way, shape or form. I love to incorporate flams into your standard-issue beats ( hat=ghost note, snare accented...reverse as well snare=ghost note, hat accented note ). This creates a nice draggy feel, and when you reverse these during a song transition - it can create wonderfully tremendous tension.

[tard]

check them out at

one of the better sites ive found and for more than jist rudiments

[cornelius]

Rudiments are a must, IMO. I worked with Billy Ward on his DVD, Voices in My Head, and one of the best lessons in the DVD is how he practices rudiments. He demonstrates playing a double stroke roll from open (RRLL RRLL very slowly - to closed (a very quiet buzz roll) to open again. It's a great exercise for your hands, but musically it's a really great way to master rudiments. He really stresses the musicality you can achieve with rudiments - not just banging them out, but really making them sound musical. It's really hard to do, IMO, but a great concept to try! Playing them on a practice pad is a good way to memorize them, but try to put in some time on the snare!

[drummer girl09]

First of all I'm going to have to admit about something. It is kind of sad. I didn't get into rudiments until a few weeks ago, maybe a month ago. I honestly didn't even know what they were, or how to use them/practice them until I started coming here. I regret not knowing them until now. My teacher never taught it to me when I started the lessons. I hear about the stories where their teachers make you start off with a practice pad and learn your technique. But my teacher never mentioned rudiments to me ever when I started or the couple of years I was with him, until my last lesson with him, when I mentioned it to him. I will have to consider myself a n00b when it comes to rudiments, but I realized that I did use some rudiments of course, in my playing, with out even knowing it. So maybe I'm not a total loss yet.

I had come to the practice early, which I didn't realize, but my teacher wanted me to help the student that he had before me, which it was his first time with the drum kit. This kid was about 12 or 13. He said that he played the band at his school percussion area. My teacher told him to play what he knew. The kid just did a small snare roll with a kick in between. My teacher and I both looked at each other thinking the same thing. We didn't think he knew anything about a kit. So my teacher told me to get on the other kit (he has two) and the simple groove, then told the boy to play it with me. He caught on very fast, which impressed me. Then later on, my teacher told him to start doing fills with me and kind of freestyle if he could. When we started he started out with the main groove then went into all this jazz sounding grooves. I could tell that he was playing all kinds of rudiments on the ride and snare, but it sounded so cool to me! And what I realized was all he was taught at the school were rudiments. He had more potential than he realized. I told him that he could be a jazz player. But my teacher acted like that wasn't what he wanted the boy to be. He wanted the boy to "lay down the groove more", which I assume to be more in control of his playing. But this kid was brand new toa kit I think, maybe played a couple of times for fun. I was really impressed though.

When I did mention it later on that night when it was actually my lesson, about the rudiments, he said it was more for jazz players, which in my mind, I didn't really approve of. I was kind of disappointed that he didn't work with rudiments. That would mean, that he can't really help me with rudiments either. He isn't a bad player at all; he's very creative and thinks of different ideas in fills and grooves. Like me, he uses the rudiments even without noticing. He told me though, was to read up on jazz books or research jazz players.

What my question was to him, was how do you put rudiments into your playing? Like in fills and such? As in a paradidle? We did actually mess around with it though, and I could see that he was impressed on what kind of stuff you could make out with the paradidles. So maybe I convinced him to start on practicing atleast the paradiddle.

I have seen sites for rudiments that have helped me a lot, and one site that actually shows you on how you could fit a rudiment into an actual fill. But do you have any advice for me on how to learn more about these things?

(I'm sorry that this was lengthy but I had to get it out because this IS a big part to learn on the drums, I realize.)

[jasonrhcp]

I was always a "groove first" player, and then learned some rudiments from my old teacher..I didn't realize the importance until the past year or so. I never memorized them until I learned how to with Pat Petrillo's Book/DVD. It helped me see how you can phrase rudiments and put them together. It's a cool "TAB" system for rudiments.

So, memorization is important. It helps when putting them into combinations for fills and solos are easier. Now I don't really "think" about them, things start to come out in my playing more easily from the little phrases I learned from Pat.

Listen to early Steve Gadd for inspiration..and of course other guys like Weckl, Vinnie,and others. You will hear all kinds of rudiment phrasing going on.

[tard]

check out this site, has a lot of stuff including all the rudiments, and examples of how to use them as a beat and as a fill, done very well, all drummers should check it out

http://www.freedrumlessons.com/drum-lessons/