Rudimental Ritual With Brushes

FunkyJazzer · #1 03-14-2009, 01:20 PM

Hi guys,
I'm not at the rudimental ritual yet, I'm reviewing all of my rudiments with sticks at the moment until I get really comfortable with them. I'm working heavily on my ruff rudiments and I'm a bit concerned in advance for when I reach playing them with brushes. From what I can tell, the ruff rudiments should be played with a "closed or orchestral interpretation", which means relying on the rebound to sort of 'dig' into the head a little bit to achieve that buzz sound, right?

So how does one achieve that closed roll with brushes? Are you supposed to play it as an open roll with the brushes?

Thanks in advance guys,
Lloyd.

xaq · #2 03-14-2009, 07:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FunkyJazzer

Are you supposed to play it as an open roll with the brushes?

yes you can't really buzz w brushes, and this will improve your wrist control and speed

Caz · #3 03-15-2009, 05:52 AM

Hi - I feel your pain, I've been doing the rudimental ritual pretty much every day for a few months. It took much longer than I'd expected to memorize it, and even longer to be able to play it perfectly in time with the cd.. and that was just the slow version, and using sticks! I've decided to alternate it daily between sticks and brushes, as it'd be amazing to be able to do it with brushes - but I like the way that it's improved my technique with sticks and I don't want that to slip whilst I'm learning it with brushes!

It's an amazing exercise though - and have you heard Alan Dawson's recording of it? Track 8 on the cd I think.. I'm at least 10 years from that!! The brushes are meant to have a really light feathery sound on doubles, not a buzz roll.. I'm pretty sure that the whole point in doing it with brushes was to force people NOT to rely on the rebound from sticks - apparently Dawson was quite adament on that from what I've read online. Please correct me if I'm wrong though! I've had noone to discuss the rudimental ritual with so I may well be learning it wrong.

Cheers, Caz

FunkyJazzer · #4 03-15-2009, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Caz

Hi - I feel your pain, I've been doing the rudimental ritual pretty much every day for a few months. It took much longer than I'd expected to memorize it, and even longer to be able to play it perfectly in time with the cd.. and that was just the slow version, and using sticks! I've decided to alternate it daily between sticks and brushes, as it'd be amazing to be able to do it with brushes - but I like the way that it's improved my technique with sticks and I don't want that to slip whilst I'm learning it with brushes!

It's an amazing exercise though - and have you heard Alan Dawson's recording of it? Track 8 on the cd I think.. I'm at least 10 years from that!! The brushes are meant to have a really light feathery sound on doubles, not a buzz roll.. I'm pretty sure that the whole point in doing it with brushes was to force people NOT to rely on the rebound from sticks - apparently Dawson was quite adament on that from what I've read online. Please correct me if I'm wrong though! I've had noone to discuss the rudimental ritual with so I may well be learning it wrong.

Cheers, Caz

Yeah man it's a great book. And I know what you mean when you want to practice two different techniques at once to make sure neither one of them slips. I'm the same with trad vs. matched! :)

jonescrusher · #5 04-27-2009, 11:52 PM

[quote=FunkyJazzer;551800

So how does one achieve that closed roll with brushes? Are you supposed to play it as an open roll with the brushes?

Thanks in advance guys,
Lloyd.[/QUOTE]

Just keep on practicing the double stroke roll with brushes....

Deltadrummer · #6 04-28-2009, 12:44 AM

The roll is a legato stroke in drumming. It helps us to play lines that are connected; we can connect quarter notes and half notes to other rhythmic phrases.

The beautiful thing about brushes is that they have a legato stroke in the sweep. For me, it would seem more beneficial expenditure of time to work with developing ideas with that stroke than in worrying about how fast you can do rudiments with brushes. It ain't gonna fly well when you sitting behind a singer and all you want to do is show how fast you can play your rudiments with brushes. That's not to say you shoudn't do the rudimental ritual with brushes or work on rudimental concepts with brushes like Clayton Cameron. But for me, it is that legato stroke, the sweep, that really makes the brushes unique.

FunkyJazzer · #7 04-28-2009, 12:58 AM

I had completely forgotton about this thread. That's some excellent advice Ken. I remember somebody saying in another thread about practicing bare rudiments this way (sweeping on the accents etc). Was that you? I hadn't thought about sweeping on the rolls.

I have now dedicated a portion of my time to practicing the bare rudiments with brushes, in the usual "Alan Dawson" manner, and also playing sweeps on the accents and rolls etc.

anp27 · #8 07-16-2009, 01:16 PM

Hey folks,
I am 30 rudiments in on the the 'Rudimental Ritual'. I'm practicing with mainly brushes because that's how it was intended to be played, with brushes. I'm sticking to slower tempi for now, 50-80 bpm. The 'Ritual' has given me a whole new sense of discipline, and making me wake up earlier in the morning to practice!! I'm actually doing a page a day, and I seem to be able to memorize each page as I practice each day. Hopefully, I'll be able to play the whole thing cleanly before the end of summer. I intend to gradually increase the tempo by 2 b.p.m. each day, and hopefully get close to Alan Dawson's tempo of the original recording, approx. 210 b.p.m., by the end of this year.

'The Drummer's Complete Vocabulary' contains an invaluable wealth of knowledge, it's definitely worth a lot a lot more than what I paid for. And I bought it online, on sale!

branflakes992 · #9 07-16-2009, 07:10 PM

I'm on the first part of the swiss rudiments right now. This book is really good. I bought it about two weeks ago. I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be open, just make the taps really close to the main stroke so there isn't hardly a gap in between that and the grace notes.

anp27 · #10 08-06-2009, 02:16 AM

Yay! I've just completed The Rudimental Ritual at 140bpm with the brushes! I have it memorized and everything seems to be executed cleanly. It baffles me how Alan Dawson played this at 210bpm, and with precision and control.
I recorded a video of me playing the Ritual at 130 last week... tried to upload it but it exceeds YouTube's 10min limit. Maybe I can upload in 2 segments..

The Colonel · #11 08-06-2009, 05:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by anp27

It baffles me how Alan Dawson played this at 210bpm, and with precision and control.

Just remind yourself that he was Tony's (and many others') teacher - and while his style (and generation) was different, I think it would be fair to say "anything he could play that guy could play".

Alan was the man.

He used to have contests with other [legendary] drummers and instead of blazing pyrotechnics, they would go for the quietest/cleanest buzz roll. They said his was like "a rat pissing on cotton"

anp27 · #12 08-06-2009, 01:24 PM

Yeah... I'm fully aware that Dawson was the teacher of many greats, including MY favorite drummer of all time, Mr. Vincent Colaiuta. That's part of the reason why I've gotten into Ramsay's book.
I've always been more drawn to the finesse players. That's where it's at.