On this page you will be learning fills in 6/8 that have a sixteenth note double kick base with the hands playing dotted quaver note crashes that are then choked. This lesson will focus solely on using the crash cymbals in this manner, in separate lessons we will look at adding some additional decoration around this. At the very bottom of the page you will find a collection of links to lessons that will help with learning the parts presented here. We have a similar lesson in the time signature of 4/4 that you may find particularly useful.
This style of fill is very common in metal genres but can be applied in many other situations. One of the cool things about it is it comes away from straight rolls around the kit and uses sounds not too common in your general playing. A 'choked' crash is one that is played then immediately stopped by being grabbed. The easiest way to do this is to strike the cymbal with the right hand then catch the cymbal with the tip of the thumb on the top and the first finger on the bottom. Be careful not to hurt your self when doing this!! Any cymbal can be choked and this will be reflected in the written examples.
This fill idea doesn't necessarily need to be applied with a groove that is using constant 16ths. Several examples of fill construction using this concept are shown below. I have tried to include as many different ideas as possible and have included different lengths of fill as well as different orchestrations. Try to take the examples below as suggestions and create as many versions of each example as possible.
Example 1
Example 2
Example 3
Example 4
Example 5
TASK
- Using the 2 minute rule, aim to get all given fills up to a tempo of at least 150bpm.
- Create further variations on these fills.
- Apply these fills to a phrased piece. .