Dave Dicenso's - Universal Rhythms book - Help needed

Grumpyone1

Junior Member
Fellow Drummers,

I have Dave Dicenso's - Univerisal Rhythms For Drumset book and it really does seem a great approach.

However I haven't yet tackled it because I'm not sure of the best way to go through each of the lessons in this book. I know Dave himself recommends in the book if you play a lot spending a week on the 1st lesson.

But there is so much you can do with the vocabulary in this lesson alone that I think only devoting a week to this lesson and each of the exercises within the lesson would be kind of really treading on the surface of the possibilities these exercises have.

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong I'm not sure, I would love to know of other people who have this book and how they have approached the first lesson and each of the exercises within the lesson?

Thanks for any help with this guys.
 
Fellow Drummers,

I have Dave Dicenso's - Univerisal Rhythms For Drumset book and it really does seem a great approach.

However I haven't yet tackled it because I'm not sure of the best way to go through each of the lessons in this book. I know Dave himself recommends in the book if you play a lot spending a week on the 1st lesson.

But there is so much you can do with the vocabulary in this lesson alone that I think only devoting a week to this lesson and each of the exercises within the lesson would be kind of really treading on the surface of the possibilities these exercises have.

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong I'm not sure, I would love to know of other people who have this book and how they have approached the first lesson and each of the exercises within the lesson?

Thanks for any help with this guys.


Wow, one week huh. It took me ten solid years to get comfortable with alternating flams on the drumkit.

Go slow, practice every day. Some things come easy, others do not.
 
Wow, one week huh. It took me ten solid years to get comfortable with alternating flams on the drumkit.

Go slow, practice every day. Some things come easy, others do not.

Thankd for the reply mate. Yes and furthermore there is plenty of different variations you can do with the exercises just in lesson 1.

For example some of the exercises at the start of lesson 1 are just snare-drum based, like a variation of the 6 stroke roll, well I could make some different variations just on that one exercise. Then I could start applying them exercises which are (in the book) just shown on the snare drum, to the drum-set.

There really is so many options with these exercises and just creating variations of the exercises alone would give you so many different possibilities.
 
Fellow Drummers,

I have Dave Dicenso's - Univerisal Rhythms For Drumset book and it really does seem a great approach.

However I haven't yet tackled it because I'm not sure of the best way to go through each of the lessons in this book. I know Dave himself recommends in the book if you play a lot spending a week on the 1st lesson.

But there is so much you can do with the vocabulary in this lesson alone that I think only devoting a week to this lesson and each of the exercises within the lesson would be kind of really treading on the surface of the possibilities these exercises have.

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong I'm not sure, I would love to know of other people who have this book and how they have approached the first lesson and each of the exercises within the lesson?

Thanks for any help with this guys.

I worked on them until I could play them comfortably.
 
I worked on them until I could play them comfortably.

Right, did you take any of the exercises which are just (in the book) notated on the snare, around the kit?

Did you do all the counting and stuff w/ the skeleton figures as well he recommends for the exercises?

Thanks!
 
Hey grumpy, I have this book. I've been pretty lazy with it but I just like playing the first 3 pages. It took me a while to get the fills sounding nice and much longer to get the vocal part down. I'd never counted while playing previously so this was a big step and I think it's a tricky book, so don't kick yourself too hard.
 
Right, did you take any of the exercises which are just (in the book) notated on the snare, around the kit?

Did you do all the counting and stuff w/ the skeleton figures as well he recommends for the exercises?

Thanks!

First time through I just did the exercises as prescribed but at some point I probably moved them around. IMO, the singing and clapping IS the material. The rest is a nice physical challenge but without the counting loses it's meaning. Once you have the counting down AND can play the exercises simultaneously, only then are you ready to move to improvising using those physical patterns (while hopefully still having your clave firmly in mind.)

He's trying to get you to develop your internal clave. THE CLAPPING/COUNTING AND THE SINGING WHILE YOU PLAY ARE THE MATERIAL.

Do the stuff as written first. Don't add or subtract or multiply. There's plenty there to keep you busy. Don't worry about taking stuff around the kit that isn't written that way just yet. Try it as prescribed for a few weeks and see where you're at.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top