brentcn
Platinum Member
At the school where I teach, there are adult students who are grouped into rock bands, and there is also an adult blues band. The blues band is more demanding on the drummer, by good amount. Rock bands require that you learn a song with a specific structure and part, but in the blues band, song forms are cyclical, and solos may vary in length and dynamic.
“Play fewer fills” or “less is more” — this is hollow advice. Rock fills tend to happen during transitional moments, or at the end of a musical phrase. In the blues, where song forms are cyclical, fills tend to sound appropriate at the end of the form. Fills that mimic the rhythms and accents played by other instruments can be used to add excitement and tension; you don’t often hear this sort of thing in rock, outside of jam bands. When you find a fill in a blues song, listen for the other instrument whose rhythm it’s copying/accenting/responding. Even the crazier Mitch Mitchell type drummers are usually going along with something that’s already there, not just playing more notes for the hell of it.
The shuffle feel is widely discussed of course. Most beginners tend to space the “and”s too far away from the downbeats. So work on squeezing those notes together. Often, a triplet spacing isn’t close enough.
“Play fewer fills” or “less is more” — this is hollow advice. Rock fills tend to happen during transitional moments, or at the end of a musical phrase. In the blues, where song forms are cyclical, fills tend to sound appropriate at the end of the form. Fills that mimic the rhythms and accents played by other instruments can be used to add excitement and tension; you don’t often hear this sort of thing in rock, outside of jam bands. When you find a fill in a blues song, listen for the other instrument whose rhythm it’s copying/accenting/responding. Even the crazier Mitch Mitchell type drummers are usually going along with something that’s already there, not just playing more notes for the hell of it.
The shuffle feel is widely discussed of course. Most beginners tend to space the “and”s too far away from the downbeats. So work on squeezing those notes together. Often, a triplet spacing isn’t close enough.
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