On this page you will be given various two bar patterns that follow an A B structure. In this case A will be a bar of groove and B will contain a fill. More specifically this will be a 'Half Bar Fill'. This means that in a bar of 4/4 the fill now only covers two beats worth of music, which is generally the second two beats of the bar. Through the first half of the bar you will play as much of the groove as you can fit into the space, so you end up with two beats of groove and two beats of fill. As the title suggests, all fills on this page will be constructed from eighth notes.
The aim here is to develop your ability to switch from groove to fill and back again without any break in timing. The slower eighth note patterns given on this page also start introducing some ideas and shapes that will be applied to more complex fills later on, making this a great introduction to fill construction and application.
The important thing here is to repeat the four bar phrases over and over, preferably with a metronome, until you can play the part several times without any breaks in timing. As discussed in similar lessons, this is an important step in building up to learning songs. I have written all exercises over four bars (so the two bar pattern is shown twice on each line) and have included Repeat Marks to highlight the importance of playing these patterns over and over.
Example 1
Example 2
Example 3
Example 4
Example 5
TASK
- Using the 2 minute rule, get all phrases up to a tempo of at least 135bpm.
- Create your own versions of these patterns by using different orchestrations of the given fill length.
Up Next
I recommend trying our A B Exercises Using Sixteenth Note Fills or A A A B Exercises Using Eighth Note Fills next.