Hi everyone,
Here are your practice assignments for this week:
Aidan
Recommended minutes to practice: 20-30 minutes per day
What to practice: Son clave and Rhumba clave rhythms along with the foot pattern and eighth notes on the ride cymbal.
How to practice it most effectively: We made a lot of progress with the son clave rhythm in your lesson this week. We isolated the hi-hat foot part (on 2 and 4) and played that along with the clave first. Then, we added in the bass drum notes with the hi-hat foot and layered it with the clave. Be sure that you can feel beats 2 and 4 on the hi-hat and the relationship of each of the clave notes to beats 2 and 4. Don’t rely on the bass drum for your sense of time or it will get confusing. Apply this same method to learning the rhumba clave rhythm.
How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.
Will
Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day
What to practice: Practice the new drum beats that we worked on as well as improvising some drum fills.
How to practice it most effectively: Continue to work on reading the rhythm of the beats in your book. Count the beats out loud before you try to play them. Make sure that any bass drum notes that come in between the hi-hat notes are played evenly so that the beat doesn’t sound unsettled. Gradually try to increase the speed of each beat without sacrificing accuracy.
How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.
Elliot
Recommended minutes to practice: 10-15 minutes per day
What to practice: The new rhythms that I wrote down in your book.
How to practice it most effectively: First identify which notes are eighth notes and which ones are sixteenth notes. Remember that the sixteenth notes will always be twice as fast as eighth notes. Try to count the rhythm out loud before playing it. Play it slowly the first time, then gradually try to increase the speed as the rhythm becomes more comfortable. Never try to play a rhythm faster than you can play it accurately.
How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.
Oscar
Recommended minutes to practice: 20-30 minutes per day
What to practice: The opening of Tom Sawyer by Rush.
How to practice it most effectively: Be sure to keep the hi-hat light and bouncy so that it doesn’t slow you down. It is important that each of the bass drum notes lines up exactly with the hi-hat, otherwise the beat will sound sloppy. Also, when opening the hi-hat, be sure to open and close it quickly to get a nice crisp sound (not too splashy). Work on the transition bar with all the crashes in it. Listen to the recording to remind yourself of how it goes.
How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.
Nate McKenzie
Recommended minutes to practice: 20-30 minutes per day
What to practice: The first verse and chorus of “Take the Money and Run” by Steve Miller Band.
How to practice it most effectively: The biggest trick to this is getting all the fills straight and playing them in the right order. The best thing to do is to look at what I wrote in your book while you’re practicing and try to memorize each of the fills as I labeled them (fill #1, fill #2, etc.) This way, if he reuses a fill later in the song, you will recognize it as fill #3 (for example) and it will be easier to remember when it comes back again. Also, be careful of which fills start on beat 3 or the bar and which ones start on beat 4.
How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.