In this concept you will be taking simple 5/4 grooves with an eighth note right hand pattern and adding accents to the quarter notes. Doing this can give the groove a little more 'drive' and is a common feature of rock drumming. This has been applied to various other time signatures and you can find links to these lessons at the bottom of the page.
Applying the concept is as simple as taking a groove and playing counts one, two, three, four and five louder than all '+' counts. Whilst playing this the stick will play a loud note followed by a normal note, so the hand will be lifted high followed by low. The right hand part for these grooves looks like this:
Listed below are some grooves with this concept applied. Be careful when eighth note kicks are added as this can sometimes throw off your right hand accents. It's worth noting that you can apply this concept to grooves where the right hand is playing quarter notes but that just involves accenting all right hand strokes so wouldn't make much of a lesson!
Example 1
Example 2
Example 3
Example 4
Example 5
TASK
- Learn the grooves above up to a tempo of at least 120bpm.
- Add more kick and snare patterns to the right hand concept.
- Use the concept as part of a phrased example.