In this lesson you will be applying the Four Hands Two Feet grouping exercise when constructing two bar fills. You can see the exercise for this pattern about half way down the linked lesson. As this grouping is made up of six notes it will have a syncopated feel to it, exactly the same way as discussed in our similar lesson using the Two Hands Four Feet type pattern. The timing and sticking for this grouping has been covered in the exercise linked above, if you aren't familiar with this basic pattern you will need to have a look through that lesson first.
On this page you will be shown some common orchestrations of this rhythm. As discussed in the lesson linked above, there are two ways the two bar version of this pattern can be constructed. It could be five occurances of the six note pattern with an eighth note left at the end or four occurances with a minim left at the end. With those left over notes there is a lot of freedom to use other fill construction ideas, especially over a minims worth of music. Various ideas for how to make use of that space will be shown below.
It is essential with these kind of hand to foot groupings that all notes fall exactly in place, if they don't the part will end up sounding sloppy and inaccurate. It would be well worth you spending some time playing the original exercise to a metronome and ensuring your placement is spot on before starting work on these fills.
Listed below are several ideas for fills following this pattern, take each fill example as an idea for constructing your own fills. Mess around with the orchestrations, particularly of the 'left over' note, and see what new patterns you can come up with. Compared to the fill lesson linked above, there are more options for orchestration as longer groupings are played on the hands.
Example 1
A straight forward orchestration where each grouping of hands is played on a different drum moving around the kit. The last two beats of the fill is just a straight roll around the kit.
Example 2
The hands are split into groups of two, played over different toms here with a quaver snare and crash.
Example 3
Straight snares on the hands and roll over toms in groups of three to end on.
Example 4
This time the hand orchestration that is used over the first two occurances of the six note pattern is repeated. This will further emphasize the syncopation.
Example 5
In this version snares and crashes are played together with a straight quaver flam at the end. This will be tough on your hand stamina but will sound cool.
Example 6
A similar fill to the one shown above, this time toms and hi hats are struck together which should be played open handed. Again, this will be strain on your hand stamina.
Example 7
In this example I am showing how the grouping can be used starting later in the first bar.
Example 8
This is a variation on the placement idea shown above, watch the last block of sixteenth notes as they don't follow the same pattern as the rest of the bar.
Example 9
This version still starts later but only by one occurance of the six note pattern, so you still have four full sets
Example 10
A variation in orchestration of the placement given above.
TASK
- Using the 2 minute rule, get all examples up to a tempo of at least 150bpm.
- Add all fills to a structured piece.
- Create your own versions of these fills by coming up with new orchestrations or combining given parts.
- Experiment with constructing longer fills.
