Jazz ride pattern - looking for good advanced technique videos on YouTube

WaitForItDrummer

Senior Member
Hi guys, could those of you who are jazz drummers point me to some good advanced level technique videos for the basic jazz ride pattern on YouTube?

Basically, I can play it at a beginner level, but it's not quite right. My instructor tells me that I play it as a 6 note pattern, instead of as a quarter note groove with an occasional triplet added (or something like that, I may be paraphrasing incorrectly).

He has already shown me twice how it should be done, broken down by strokes - with the empasis on the quarter notes and a de-empasized rebound on the triplet and I can feel and hear the difference, but when I try this at home, I revert to the 'beginner style' 6 beat hits on the ride... Which sounds pretty bad... Needless to say, beginning to feel a bit stupid...

Have tried watching Peter Erskine's Timekeeping is everything - but the one I found on YouTube only has a few seconds of the basic ride pattern.

A you tube search on this turned up 100s of vids, and hard to tell which ones are good.

Any advice, links to what videos to watch from those of you who really know jazz would be very much appreciated. Cheers.
 
Try this: play the following pattern with your right hand on the ride cymbal, left hand on snare (or vice versa, if you play left-handed).

R-L-L R-L-R R-L-L R-L-R

Play it slow and make sure you evenly space the triplets out with a metronome. Add a hi-hat on 2 & 4; don't add anything else.

Once you're comfortable there, remove the snare from the equation and keep playing the ride pattern with hi-hat. Find medium-tempo swing recordings and work on playing this pattern along to the recordings. Again, don't add anything else. This is the most important pattern you'll play as a jazz drummer, and every bass player who is worth anything will want that pattern played perfectly in time so they can lay in their bass lines comfortably.
 
Beware, there are a lot of very bad ones out there; a lot of people who are not actually jazz musicians (and a few who are) have developed some rather elaborate techniques that are a total waste of time. You don't need to over-analyse it; just go for an economical stroke (like in this Steve Jordan video), listen to a lot of music, and play the pattern a lot (with people, hopefully), and you'll find your own technique.

You can also watch Erskine or Ian Froman, or any famous jazz drummer. But you really have to just play it a lot-- you don't need a lot of information to get this.
 
Try this: play the following pattern with your right hand on the ride cymbal, left hand on snare (or vice versa, if you play left-handed).

R-L-L R-L-R R-L-L R-L-R

Play it slow and make sure you evenly space the triplets out with a metronome. Add a hi-hat on 2 & 4; don't add anything else.

Once you're comfortable there, remove the snare from the equation and keep playing the ride pattern with hi-hat. Find medium-tempo swing recordings and work on playing this pattern along to the recordings. Again, don't add anything else. This is the most important pattern you'll play as a jazz drummer, and every bass player who is worth anything will want that pattern played perfectly in time so they can lay in their bass lines comfortably.


Thanks, vxla -I'll give this a go.

I would suggest to start with the Drummerworld Drumclinic Section - Jazz

There you find great lessons from Peter Erskine and much more...

http://www.drummerworld.com/Drumclinic/jazz.html

Bernhard

Thanks, Bernhard, the medium temp video helps a lot! That's the sort of thing I was looking for.

Beware, there are a lot of very bad ones out there; a lot of people who are not actually jazz musicians (and a few who are) have developed some rather elaborate techniques that are a total waste of time. You don't need to over-analyse it; just go for an economical stroke (like in this Steve Jordan video), listen to a lot of music, and play the pattern a lot (with people, hopefully), and you'll find your own technique.

You can also watch Erskine or Ian Froman, or any famous jazz drummer. But you really have to just play it a lot-- you don't need a lot of information to get this.

Thanks, Todd, yeah, I think I have already over-analysed this and it's time to just 'get it' - so good advice about listening and playing and finding own right technique hopefully. Just don't want to get stuck with the wrong technique.. I do like the Steve Jordan video -
 
Steve smith has a great way to embrace the triplet feel under quarter notes in his "History of the US Beat" DVD.

Just remember - Ride cymbal: Walk the-dog, walk the-dog, walk the-dog, walk the-dog...
 
Our old friend Andrew Hare (anyone know what he's up to these days?) posted a great piece on isolating your ride cymbal technique in his blog post here: http://haredrums.blogspot.com/2012/04/fundamentals-of-jazz-drumming-part-one.html

I would recommend all of his blog, not just this piece. Andrew is a great player and a very thoughtful cat who can really explain concepts well, IMO.

Thanks, 8Mile! That's an excellent video by Andew Hare. I found his blog about creating an arrangement a few months ago - that's also really good.

Steve smith has a great way to embrace the triplet feel under quarter notes in his "History of the US Beat" DVD.

Just remember - Ride cymbal: Walk the-dog, walk the-dog, walk the-dog, walk the-dog...

Thanks, cornelius. I'll check it out.
 
Back
Top