In this Drag Tap orchestration you will be 'planting' any stroke that isn't a grace note on the snare whilst the grace notes moves around various parts of the kit. This has been applied to other rudiments and you can find a list of links to useful lessons at the bottom of the page. As discussed previously, these exercises are intended to get you comfortable both with the basic rudiment and some of the movements you might see when the rudiment is used practically.
A cool effect of this rudiment is that the standard notes will play a constant rhythm on the snare whilst the grace notes add some interest. This can make the part sound far more complicated than it is.
I have added feet to each exercise to increase the challenge but feel free to remove these whilst you are learning the orchestration. Experiment with using different feet patterns from our previous lessons and try different sticking variations also. I have used a combination of both the rudiment as quavers and semi quavers. Some of the patterns below will have certain parts that would be easier with the reverse sticking, see if you can work out which. Some exercises may require crossing over of the hands if the reverse sticking is used, be careful not to knock your sticks out of your hands in these cases.
Exercise 1
Exercise 2
Exercise 3
Exercise 4
Exercise 5
Exercise 6
TASKS
- Get all exercises up to a tempo of at least 110bpm.
- Create your own orchestrations using this concept.
- Use as many different feet patterns as you can think of with each exercise.
