7/8 Grooves With A '23333' Kick And Snare

In this lesson you will be learning grooves in 7/8 that are built around a syncopated rhythm. To achieve this you will come away from the standard groupings of this time signature by playing a reversed version of the sixteenth note '3 3 3 3 2' pattern. The '233' rhythm is one that has been explored in many different ways through the last few levels so you will hopefully be fairly familiar with a lot of the content on this page. This new rhythm can be thought of an extension of this '233' pattern that has an extra two sets of '3' at the end.

At the bottom of the page you will find a list of links to other lessons that may be useful in learning the parts on this page. If you are unfamiliar with describing rhythms with numbers this is explained in several of those lessons.

To build up the grooves on this page you first need to be familiar with the base rhythm. This is obviously described by the numbering but this is notated below with phrase markings and accents to clarify the grouping.

The base rhythm for these grooves

Spend some time getting familiar with this base rhythm as everything on this page relies on this grouping of sixteenth notes.

The groove patterns on this page are all constructed by orchestrating this rhythm in two different forms then applying right hands in various different ways. There are obviously many other ways this rhythm can be applied but they will explored in other lessons. For the first orchestration, the first note of the grouping will be played on the snare then the other notes will be on kicks. Like this:

An orchestration of the base rhythm

The second version of this is the exact reverse. So the first note is played on a kick and the rest on the snare. Like this:

An orchestration of the base rhythm

Again, spend time familiarizing yourself with these two parts to get a feel for the new time signature. Listed below are several versions of these parts with right hands applied, a note has been included in each to explain what the right hand is doing.


Example 1

The right hand plays straight eighths on a ride.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 2

Straight eighths on the second crash with the reverse orchestration.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 3

Applying quarter note right hands as much as possible. Quarter notes don't fit evenly into a bar of 7/8 so you either have two quarter notes and a dotted quarter note or three quarter notes and a quaver. The later is applied here on an open hi hat. Notice that these right hands alternate between falling on a snare and a kick.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 4

The same right hand idea is applied but on a china cymbal with the reverse orchestration.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 5

The right hand falls with the snares using the crash cymbal in this example.Notice how when applied with this orchestration the right hand accents the start of each grouping.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 6

The same idea applied to the reverse orchestration using the ride bell.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 7

Apply the right hand with the bass drums, in this case using a splash.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


Example 8

The same right hand idea applied to the reverse orchestration. As with example 5, the right hand now accents the start of each grouping.

A 7/8 groove using a 3 3 2 2 rhythm


TASK

  1. Learn all grooves up to a tempo of at least 125bpm.
  2. Experiment with different orchestrations of the base rhythm.
  3. Apply different right hand rhythms and orchestrations.
  4. Apply these pattern within a longer phrase.

Lessons

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