One Bar 3 3 3 3 4 Multi Rhythmed Constant Double Kick Groove

In this lesson you will be learning a second version of the One Bar 3 3 2 Multi Rhythmed Constant Double Kick Groove. In that version you used a set of syncopated eighth note snares combined with a standard 16th double kick. This time you will be using a group of syncopated 16th notes. This lesson will be laid out in a similar way to the previous one, so the part will be built up gradually and variations on it will be given at the end.

The individual parts of this pattern are very simple, but combining the timing and placement of the snare drums can easily throw you off. As mentioned above I will present the part in a 'step by step' format to help you understand more clearly what is going on. Once learned though some really interesting groove patterns can be played.


Step 1 - Right Hand And Feet

The foundation of this pattern will be a sixteenth note single stroke roll play over the two feet on bass drums with the right hand playing eighth notes, for the sake of this lesson that will be on the ride. That base pattern is shown below and is exactly the same as in the previous lesson:

The foundation for this groove.

So that is very similar to exercise and groove patterns you will have seen in other double kick related lessons, nothing overly complicated. That said, make sure you can play this consistantly at a decent tempo before moving on.

It was mentioned above that the full groove could be desribed as 'multi rhythmed'. The pattern above gives you the first two rhythms, straight sixteenths and straight eighths. The snares add in the final rhythm so lets look at that now.

Step 2 - Snares

The snare placement is the important part of this groove as it provides a slightly more interesting rhythmic pattern. They will be playing a sixteenth note '3 3 3 3 4' type pattern, which is perhaps simpler than it sounds. The numbers refer to groupings within a series of even notes, so you would have four groups of three then a group of four. This is shown in the bar of music below. I have placed an accent at the start of each grouping and used phrase marks above to clarify.

An example of 3 3 3 3 4 straight eighths.

The way you will approach this for this groove is as individual note values. As the numbers are referring to sixteenth notes, a 3 would mean a dotted quaver as that would last for three sixteenth notes worth of space. Using that logic a '4' would then mean a straight crotchet. Meaning the rhythm implied in that case is four dotted quavers followed by a crotchet. So the rhythm the snares are going to play for the final groove will be this:

3 3 3 3 4 as single notes

When put with the right hand the rhythm should be a bit clearer. Try that now, the notation is below. Notice that snares are now falling between the right hand.

The hands for this groove.

Before proceeding to the next step make sure you can play this two handed part comfortably. The final step will be putting it all together.

Step 3 - The Full Groove

Finally you need to combine all the parts discussed above. First of all lets start with a version using a simplified single foot kick pattern. The pattern below takes the two hands and uses straight eighth notes on the right foot. The point of this is to get you comfortable with the placement of the snares whilst kick drums are involved. You need to make sure that all snares and bass drums fall together accuractely otherwise the part will sound sloppy. Try that now:

The groove with eighth note feet.

Almost there! The final step is to add in the 16th note bass drums. To do that you just need to fill in the left foot between the right foot. All snares will always fall with a right foot which makes things a lot simpler. Once you are comfortable with the eighth note version try the full groove shown below. Dont' be afraid to start very slowly to make sure everything is falling in the right place, it's much easier to push the tempo of a pattern you are fully comfortable with. Here's the complete groove:

The full groove.


Simple Variations

Once you have learned the full version above and can playing consitantly at around 100bpm try applying some of these simple variations and will only involve switching around the right hand. These are the most basic changes to the pattern, more complicated ideas will be discussed in later lessons.

Variation 1 - Quarter Note Rides

As the tital says, in this version switch the right hand ride part from eighth notes to quarter notes. This gives a bit more variety in your layers of rhythm. I have notated these on the crash in this example for further variation in the groove.

The full groove with right hand quarter notes.


Variation 2 - Follow The Snares With The Right Hand

This idea takes away from the 'multi layered' aspect of the groove but is a pretty cool pattern. All you do is play the same '3 3 3 3 4' rhythm with the right hand, so both hands are playing the same. I've shown this with chinas below.

The full groove with right hand following left.


Variation 3 - Linear 3 3 3 3 4 Hands

In this version you will be playing around with a linear style pattern on the hands. The full groove won't strictly be linear as you will still have the 16th note feet under it. What you will end up with is something similar to the straight eighth 3 3 3 3 4 idea discussed above split between two hands. The snare and right hand pattern is shown below, the snare is to be played with the left and the ride the right as you would expect. This patterns will be quite quick but sound awesome.

An alternate hand pattern

And then the same hand part with the feet applied. I have notated the snare in voice 1 here to clarify the hand movement. An alternate hand pattern with feet


TASK

  1. Using the 2 minute rule, get all grooves and variations up to a tempo of at least 130bpm.
  2. Create further variations using the ideas presented.
  3. Apply these grooves to a phrased piece as either the groove or fill.
  4. Think about what other ways this pattern could be messed around with to create new patterns.

Lessons

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