This lesson can be thought of as a continuation of our Offbeat Double 16th Note Right Hands lesson where you played an '+ a' rhythm using two right hands. On this page you will be playing similar groove patters but exploring some different stickings for the right hand rhythm. It would be very useful to have worked through the previous linked lesson before starting these exercises.
There are several reasons for changing the sticking within a groove. The tempo of a piece maybe too high for you to comfortable use a double sticking. You may want to add some extra notes in on the right hand that make using the left for the hi hat a better idea. As you experiment with the ideas below you will hopefully become aware of the advantages and disadvantages of each idea.
I have split this lesson up into smaller sections. In each section you will be shown a sticking for the right hand a long with some groove examples using it. Some will be very easy but some may require a bit of work in terms of co ordination depending on how strong your left hand is.
Remember that the sound of the right hand in each exercise will be the same as those in the previous lesson linked above, it is only the way you play the parts that has changed.
'R L' Sticking
This sticking arguably makes the part a little easier and is very similar to the '1 +a' 16 Beat Variation. Using this sticking means all snares will be played with the right hand. The hands for a groove using this sticking in common time would look like this:
Note that because of the way the hands fall, this style of playing is often written with the snare in voice 1.
'R L' Groove Example 1
'R L' Groove Example 2
'R L' Groove Example 3
'L L' Sticking
The next sticking I'll show you is the reverse of the original pattern. So rather than playing 'RR' on the right hand, this time it will be 'LL'. As with the previous part, the snares will be played on the right hand here.
With this sticking you will struggle to use the ride, or indeed any part of the kit on the right hand side of the kit, when playing a snare on the back beat. It does however open up a lot of options. I have included some of these here but they have a much higher difficulty rating. The intention with these is to show you the point of using this sticking and why it is worth practicing now.
'L L' Groove Example 1
'L L' Groove Example 2
'L L' Groove Example 3
'L R' Sticking
This time you will be using a reverse single stroke sticking. This is particularly useful if you want to play a high tempo version of this rhythm with a second snare. The back beat is now on the left hand again.
With this sticking you will struggle to use the ride, or indeed any part of the kit on the right hand side of the kit, when playing a snare on the back beat. It does however open up a lot of options. I have included some of these here but they have a much higher difficulty rating. The intention with these is to show you the point of using this sticking and why it is worth practicing now.
'L R' Groove Example 1
'L R' Groove Example 2
'L R' Groove Example 3
'R R L L' Sticking
In this last idea I'm going to show you how you can combine some of the examples above, in this case using the original and 'L L' stickings. The cool thing about doing this is that you could use each hand on a different cymbal. If the right covers the right and the left the hi hat you would get something like this.
Either hand could be used to play the snare so experiment and see what feels comfortable to you. In the grooves below I have thrown in some further variations on the orchestration of the hands.
'R R L L' Groove Example 1
'R R L L' Groove Example 2
'R R L L' Groove Example 3
TASKS
- Learn the grooves above up to a tempo of at least 130bpm.
- Create some 4 bar phrases where this concept is applied to the groove.
- Create further variations on the given examples as well as experimenting with different sticking. I have given only one version of a combined sticking so there are many options left there.
