Hi everyone,
Here are your assignments for this week:
Will
Recommended minutes to practice: 20-30 minutes per day
What to practice: Keep working on the accent patterns, combining different patterns together to make new patterns, and try to tighten up page 3 of Tom Sawyer.
How to practice it most effectively: Practice each of the accent patterns by playing the accents first on the snare drum and then on the toms. You can also split the accents between snare and toms. Then pick two accent patterns and try playing the first half of one with the second half of the other. This will create new and interesting patterns. With Tom Sawyer, focus on playing page 3 together with the recording. Listen carefully to make sure you can line up with the rest of the song.
Elliot
Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day
What to practice: Practice the rhythms we worked on in your lesson and work on playing them as drum fills.
How to practice it most effectively: Read each rhythm carefully and practice counting them out loud before you play them. This is the best way to translate the notation on the page into actual sound and rhythm. Then, once you can count the rhythms in steady time, practice playing them on the drums. You can move the rhythms around the drums in different ways and also put them together with a drum beat.
Jared
Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day
What to practice: Practice playing the 12/8 beats and drum fills together with the song “Oh Darlin’” by the Beatles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BznFjbcBVs
How to practice it most effectively: Be sure to count the beats either out loud or in your head when you practice them. It’s important that they have a triplet feel which you can count as “1 & a 2 & a 3 & a 4 & a…” With the fills, practice playing different combinations of eighth notes and sixteenth notes around the drums. Be creative with them! Once you have a good handle on the beats and fills, the practice playing them in time with the song.
Noah
Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day
What to practice: Practice the 16-bar exercise from Lesson One together with the jazz ride pattern and foot patterns, and take a look at these new snare patterns: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Dga1ZBRWaN_Ka4O1G009w-74c4VaZCj7?usp=share_link
How to practice it most effectively: When practicing the 16-bar exercises, try to stay relaxed. Remember that jazz isn’t supposed to feel heavy or strained in any way. If you feel like you body is tense then your playing will sound tense. See if you can get through the whole 16-bar exercise without tensing up. With the new snare patterns, the left hand will now have to play eighth notes together with the right hand. This might feel weird at first, but play them slowly and focus on identifying when the hands are playing together and when the right hand is playing alone.
Koel
Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day
What to practice: Practice the Intro, Verse, and Pre-Chorus from “When I Come Around” by Green Day.
How to practice it most effectively: Listen to the song a few times this week so that you can get familiar with how it goes. Focus on the drum fills that I have written down for you. Practice each fill by itself a few times in a row and try to do them the same way each time. This helps your brain to remember how they go. Then practice playing the fills together with the beats from the song. Practice the transitions between the beats and fills so that you can play without hesitation.
Caroline
Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day
What to practice: Keep working on the syncopation exercises and practice the Intro, Verse, and Chorus from “Say It Ain’t So” by Weezer.
How to practice it most effectively: With the syncopation exercises, practice them slowly so that you can place each note in exactly the right spot. Focus on keeping a steady pulse on the hi-hat and fitting the bass and snare notes into that pulse. Once you have a good handle on each exercises, then start it again at a slightly faster speed. When this new speed feels comfortable, then try an even faster speed. Do this in small, gradual steps. With the Weezer song, focus on getting the switch between the ride and hi-hat and also the crashes in the Chorus.