Wilcoxon No.114 WTF?!?

Odd-Arne Oseberg

Platinum Member
I always skip this and forget to talk about it, but my question should self explanatory, I guess.
 
Uhhh that's all screwed up. Normally I believe a ruff on a roll is old school rudimental-ese for starting the roll a 16th note early, with the ruff played at the same speed as the body of the roll. But here he's not including the ruff in the name of the rolls, so maybe you're supposed to crush the ruff in a little faster. Or maybe he's following some 1930s drummer logic that makes no sense whatsoever to modern man.

You also have to ignore the internal stickings for the roll-- you would have to change the pulsation speed in the middle of the roll to match what he has written. Just play the roll at an even speed, starting and ending on the indicated hand. Oh and the last 12 also ends differently than all the other 12s, despite being exactly the same and starting on the same hand.

I'm starting to think these old timey rudimental knuckleheads didn't understand notation very well. I've completely lost patience with trying to figure their crap out.
 

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It is strange. I go through them all regularly and the rest of the etudes look fine.

It's been in print for "a while", so it's sorta weird.
 
Hmm, the sticking in my edition is different. I have no idea how it is supposed to be played but I'd think that the first two lefts are double the tempo of the roll.



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If you omit the drag, these are 16th-note 9 stroke rolls from beat 2 to beat 6 in 6/8. The drag is squeezed in between beat 1 and 2 making it an 11 stroke roll.

Those with a "12" are exactly the same but note # "12" is actually beat 1 of the next bar.

John
 
Cool to hear from you John.

Just so we all understand the reason for my question, this is how it looks in my copy.

I guess you can play it, sort of, but it makes no sense.

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A couple of problems with that video:

-- I haven't seen rolls released with the same hand as the last double stroke anywhere in any Wilcoxon book. He writes all of these things out note for note elsewhere. I wouldn't assume presence of some new, very technical thing just because it's implied by him writing his rolls weirdly/wrongly in a couple of solos.

-- I think the solos in 6/8 are meant to be played faster than in the video, like regular 6/8 march tempo, where the "pull out" really isn't feasible. He has written things in 3/4 and 3/8 where the rolls are written as rhythms, that are clearly meant to be in the tempo range in the video, but still none of the rolls end that way.

On the other hand, his books are full of weird, non-literal stuff-- like how are you supposed fit a ruff in the space after a 32nd note at any normal tempo? Clearly what's intended is a roll with a quintuplet pulsation-- which is a thing that is done all the time-- but for whatever reason notating it that way was a problem for him. Apparently he also had a problem notating tap rolls in 6/8.
 

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I think we can safely assume that none of these exercises were originally intented to work on impossible stuff that would have no real use to anyone. lol

It is strange though that with such an old book no effort's been made to correct the mistakes.
 
It is strange though that with such an old book no effort's been made to correct the mistakes.
It seems that way. But I was listening to an episode of the Drummer's Weekly Groovecast podcast where Phil interviewed Ted Mackenzie and they were talking about how difficult it was to get anyone to do anything about even obvious errors in some of these drum method books. They may seem huge to us in the drumming community, but relatively speaking, there aren't that many copies sold and the cost of publishing corrections is prohibitive.
 
He was no Alistair MacLean, I'm sure, but they could at least start a small piece of paper with corrections along with the book, or something.
 
Exactly! I was also talking about an interpretation of the 'correct' solos to make the book more accessible.

Stuff like how to play the drags (which is explained a bit in Modern Rudimental Solos) and the rhythmic value of 5 and 7 stroke rolls. Then maybe a short statement which solos are most likely wrong. Right now everybody has to figure out stuff on their own.

I'm sure there are enough knowledgeable drummers who would write this one page for Ludwig without charging too much. :)
 
It seems that way. But I was listening to an episode of the Drummer's Weekly Groovecast podcast where Phil interviewed Ted Mackenzie and they were talking about how difficult it was to get anyone to do anything about even obvious errors in some of these drum method books. They may seem huge to us in the drumming community, but relatively speaking, there aren't that many copies sold and the cost of publishing corrections is prohibitive.

First, thanks for listening to the show. I appreciate your continued support.

Second, I'm super late to this show.

Third, to add to the wackiness of revisions, it is also my understanding that aside from the cost prohibitive nature of making sometimes obvious corrections, in other non-obvious potential corrections publishers are hesitant to 'correct' what could be the original author's intention. On top of that, some revisionists don't necessarily want the responsibility of changing things they're not 100% sure of.

A couple of positive revisions have been Tony Cirone modifying some things in the Goldenberg Snare and keyboard methods. Both of those are very well done.

Phil
 
Continuing this small collection of potential typos and oddities: This one's from "Swinging the 26" which I wanted to give another shot today. The way I understand it, drags are normally played as two 32nd notes when the rhythm is in 16th's but here it's probably two grace notes right before 1. The sticking is also maybe a typo and is hopefully "rr L" - Please correct me if I'm wrong.
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I had a look at Rick Dior's interpretation and he also changed the sticking:
By the way: He uploaded many videos of solos from that book.
 
Continuing this small collection of potential typos and oddities: This one's from "Swinging the 26" which I wanted to give another shot today. The way I understand it, drags are normally played as two 32nd notes when the rhythm is in 16th's but here it's probably two grace notes right before 1. The sticking is also maybe a typo and is hopefully "rr L" - Please correct me if I'm wrong.
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I had a look at Rick Dior's interpretation and he also changed the sticking:
By the way: He uploaded many videos of solos from that book.

First, the videos and explanations from Rick Dior are VERY good. His introductory video explaining the approach to the Wilcoxon method is fantastic. There may indeed by a few typos because, like he said, it still happens in modern methods printed today.

That being said, there is another interpretation of this that would take the printed stickings into consideration. Sanford Moeller said in his method book that when you have two grace notes that immediately follow a 16th note it can be 'flattened' or 'crushed' to the point of being a buzz. He called this a 'ruff' and the open, normal rudimental interpretation a ' half drag' (Of course, this is old terminology that has a different meaning today). Moeller, said that by interpreting this rhythm as a 'ruff' it would be executed using the exact same motion as a flam but using two grace notes and would produce a closed 'rut' type of sound. Moeller mentioned that his interpretation of 'half drag' (otherwise known as our modern drag) would use less finger pressure and literally 'drag the notes out' whereas the ruff would use significantly more pressure.

Overall, the normal, open rudimental interpretation of the drag adds significantly more rhythmic embellishment giving the piece a more martial character. In the case you are inquiring about, 'Swinging the 26', you're putting a 'ruff' in a place where there's virtually no time to play it. It's difficult but can be done. However the stickings normally have the drag or ruff starting on the opposite hand of the preceding 16th note.

Hope this helps,

Phil
Drummer's Weekly Groovecast
 
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Continuing this small collection of potential typos and oddities: This one's from "Swinging the 26" which I wanted to give another shot today. The way I understand it, drags are normally played as two 32nd notes when the rhythm is in 16th's but here it's probably two grace notes right before 1. The sticking is also maybe a typo and is hopefully "rr L" - Please correct me if I'm wrong.
View attachment 91316
I had a look at Rick Dior's interpretation and he also changed the sticking:
By the way: He uploaded many videos of solos from that book.
I actually don’t have a problem with that sticking. I think it is possible to play without too much trouble and is actually the kind of idea represented in Cirone etude #2 from Portraits in Rhythm and from some of the Russian orchestral literature ie. Lt. Kije. I would not change it.I’ve noticed Dior will change things to make it easier for his preferred tempos, fast.
 
I actually don’t have a problem with that sticking. I think it is possible to play without too much trouble and is actually the kind of idea represented in Cirone etude #2 from Portraits in Rhythm and from some of the Russian orchestral literature ie. Lt. Kije. I would not change it.
Me either. The sticking works and the etude is supposed to swing, so keeping the tempo down will make the figure reasonable to play.
 
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