Keeping time through fills

by Rob Gordon http://www.learn-to-play-drums.com

One of the main jobs for a drummer is to create a groove and keep it going and flowing and yeap we all pretty much can do that, but I have found that lots of times when I play a fill I tend to speed up and lose my groove in the process. i.e. When I start to play time again it feels off and other band members look at me.

I would guess that you also would have seen and heard the same thing.

Well here are a couple of tips from a couple of great drummers on how to deal with this.

First up, Gregg Bissonette suggests that you play 8th notes on the bass drum when you are playing a fill. He says Steve White has been doing this for years!!! And to quote Gregg " and it works because it means there's something going on, something grooving through your fill. And where does that come from? It comes from Ringo on "The End" (From The Beatles' Abbey Road)."

My preferred method is to play alternative 8th notes on bass and hi hat. When I was doing my grade 3 school of Music I had to learn this fill.

As a side point, from being able to play alternative 8th notes on bass and hi hat and the fill above, I was able to learn the basic beat to RHCP's "Throw away your television" pretty quickly.

If you have read a lot of the stuff on the site you will know I am a big Chad Smith and RCHP fan.

My other way of keeping time in fills is to play to a click, now before half of your reading this go - I hate clicks, go to my article on playing to a click and check that out.

Another tip I have here is to play a groove that has a fill in it, that way the fill becomes part of the groove and not something that gets added in every 4 or 8 bars.

For example I have learnt the basic beat to "Breaking the girl" this is a 6/8 beat, but to "spice it up and make it groove" as Chad Smith says he play two triplets on the beats 5 and 6.

Click here for this beat and how it sounds when I play it

My last tip is to practise slower to ensure that your sticking in your fill is fluid and confident.

Then as you get happy with you groove and timing you can speed up to the your required speed.

My very last tip is to record yourself, that way you can hear exactly how you play your groove and how your fills affect that groove.

To quote Gregg B again

"The other thing that is so great and I believe this is how all the studio greats got to be so good, the Steve Gadds and the Jeff Porcaros is you play a groove for 3 mins and then the producer says "Come on in guys, we'll talk ".

You go in and they play it back on this amazing speakers and it sounds fantastic and you get the chance to really hear yourself.

Its like the best drum lesson in the world. You get to learn so much about your playing."

As always if you have any comments pls email me rob@learn-to-play-drums.com but please put the text "Not spam:" in your subject line first to help me sort the spam from your mail

Take Care and happy drumming

Regards

Rob