I’ve been a musician for quite a while but finally bought myself a drum kit.
As a guitarist I know not all practice is good practice, or at least productive practice. For example, practicing scales up and down the neck will help learn those scales… but can make soloing sound super robotic.
Was hoping to get some advice for being productive while practicing rudiments, but any other practice advice is welcome too :)
I think that any practice you do on rudiments is good, but 2 things that night help:
- The building blocks of almost anything is single and double strokes, so make sure you have those down
- It’s important to practice with a metronome but sometimes it gets boring. On Spotify there are playlists by BPM and it’s more enjoyable to practice to music than to a metronome. The upside is that your never need to find or match the scale!
The upside is that your never need to find or match the scale!
Lol, not having to worry about scales is something I’ve actually been so excited about as a guitarist. Which might be a little ironic considering changing keys is so easy on guitar…
Thanks for the advice!
This guy did some really good, quick intro videos to a whole load of rudiments a few years ago. Might have to scroll back a bit, but I found them really useful https://youtube.com/@SachaKDrums
And Stick Control by George Lawrence Stone is the book for rudiments + a bit more. Can’t recommend it enough
Make sure to try and play with dynamics; how loud each hit is. This makes a huge difference in not sounding robotic.
Would you be able to elaborate on how to practice that? Any exercises you know of or vids to watch?
Inserting ghost notes in simple grooves is one way, but even just practicing paradiddles with the accent on the first PA- of paradiddle instead of doing it all at he same volume.
Also gets you to practice singles and doubles at the same time.
Like this: https://youtu.be/-imiZIrGwXE
And for ghost notes, Rob Brown got a good exercise video as well: https://youtu.be/dt_D_cVHqec
But both are more intermediate level drumming. At a beginner level, the main priority is staying on time. Doesn’t matter how simple the groove is, play to a metronome and make sure you stay on time. That’s the whole point of the drums after all; keeping time.
I’ve actually been practicing paradiddles with the accent for a bit, so I should def focus on not doing the accent lol. And even for other rudiments, I’ve noticed that whenever I try to incorporate the kick drum it’s hard for me to not bring my right arm down a little harder than my left. Something I am working on.
I’ve been trying to play to a metronome as much as I can, and I’ve figured out that my time is definitely not as good as I thought it was either haha. Even after playing and recording guitar to a click for a while, there is a lot less leeway for drummers it seems…
Thanks for the tips! And I’ll be sure to check those vids out as well.
My routine is to take a page from Stick Control for the Snare Drummer, put on a metronome app which had a counter, and move to the next rudiment after 50 repeats. Starts boring but after a while you get to this point where your like “oh lol I’m already at 300 repeats?”.
Sometimes watching something if its slow and easy enough that you can keep a correct form without thinking. Keeping the form right is key here (“practise makes permanent, so practice perfectly”).
Honestly I like repetition like that, I’ve been treating it as a meditation session lol. What metronome app do you use? I’ve never seen one with a counter (not that I’ve tried all that many).
