This article was written by The Zillennial Zine’s spring editorial intern Henry Ryeder. Find him on Instagram at @henryryeder. If you would like to share an article with The Zillennial, send us an email at thezillennialzine@gmail.com.
Practicing the drums, in the words of the late great Buddy Rich, “is boring.” As with all musical instruments, the drums aren’t best played in isolation. Music begets music, and a collaborator’s sense of time is more important than any metronome. This isn’t because there’s anything less magical about a steady BPM. The sense of sharing musicality is one of the most beautiful aspects of music-making. If it’s not the reason you’ve become a musician, it’ll certainly turn into a reason you stay one.
But we all must practice at some point, even if to familiarize ourselves with a kit. And that’s why practicing is important, even if it’s not always “fun.” If you’re looking to get more familiar with the many aspects of a drum kit, and wondering how to play drums better, here are some good tips to start.
Parts of a Drum Kit
Let’s start by outlining the different pieces on a drum kit.
Snare Drum: The punch. Producing a sharp, short transient, the snare drum sits to the left of the drummer, allowing fast alternations between snare and hi-hat. With a white “batter head” on top that quickly resonates “snare wires” on the bottom, the snare drum formulates the primordial sound of the human clap in a single tone.
Kick Drum: The heart. Kick drums lie directly in front of the drummer, and produce the lowest-frequency sound of the kit. Drummers use a foot pedal to knock a “beater” against the head of the kick drum, producing a beefy tone.
Hi Hat: The glue. Standing to the left of the drummer, the hi-hat is produces a mechanical, often “chirpy” tone that serves to syncopate the rhythm implied by the kick, snare, or tom patterns. Consisting of two cymbals resting in a saucer-like formation, the hat can be opened or closed via a foot pedal.
Toms: The belly. Resting on a rack above the kick, as well as one to the right (this is the Floor Tom), the Toms provide resonant, low-frequency tones that can be pitched to produce a wide variety of sounds. Think of the opening drum hits in the outro of Phil Collins’s “In The Air Tonight” or the militant march of the Psychedelic Furs’ “Love My Way.”
Ride: The Ride functions quite similarly to the hat, though it produces a longer, more resonant tone. This is often used to produce a driving syncopation that’s more “elegant” than the hat.
Crash: The most onomatopoeia piece of the drum set, the crash does what it promises: produce a mighty, shimmery transient with a long tail. Depending on the size of the kit, there may be two crashes: a smaller one in between the hat and rack toms, and larger one behind the floor tom.
Grip
Before you even sit down on the drum throne, you’ll probably be thinking about your sticks. The vast majority of drumming, after all, comes from the upper body. Learning to exact control and dynamics over the hat, ride, toms, and snare are paramount to becoming a solid drummer. This necessitates a decent understanding of grip. While these three grips below don’t come close to encompassing the full range of options, they’re a good basis for further exploration.
Holding The Sticks: First of all, imagine you’re holding a wand. Place the stick in the middle of your hand and wrap your fingers around it, so that your thumb gently lands vertically on the stick as the rest of your hand holds it. Great, you’ve got your first grip! Now how do we use this to play the drums?
German – This grip is analogous to dribbling a basketball. With the sticks in your hand, move them up and down vertically at the natural hinge on your wrist. If you were a judge holding a gavel, this is the grip you’d use to bring order to the court.
French – Take the German grip and offset slightly in the natural bend of your wrist, so that you’re moving the stick slightly diagonally. This is the French grip, and it comes in handy when keeping time on pieces of the drum kit that are harder to get to (ride cymbal) and if you’re looking to exact a softer tone.
Push/Pull – We’re skipping ahead quite a bit here, and many teacher would understandably argue that Push/Pull is a “stroke” and not a “grip,” as it applies to the grip once it’s hit the drum kit. Still, Push/Pull has implications for your grip, so we’re going to classify it here. For Push/Pull, start in the German position. Play a “rebound” stroke on a drum, keep your fingers loose so that the stick naturally jumps backward after the hit. After a couple of times getting used to this feeling, start to squeeze the stick back into your fingers after the stick makes contact. You’ll notice that the stick immediately bounces back, giving you another hit. You’re on your way to virtuosic doubles!
Kick
There is nothing like a kick drum. While a snare’s transient is unmistakable (and jarring if it sounds terrible), the stomping lows of a kick drum are foundational like no other part of a kit, and arguably a band. Changing the kick rhythm can alter our perception of a song.
Take these two versions of the perfect pop song “Bizarre Love Triangle” for example. In the original 1986 version by New Order, the kick plays a sparse “1——-3-and-uh” rhythm. The amount of time between the first kick hit and the successive, jittery double hit at the end of the phrase creates a distinctive, syncopated rhythm. Compare this to Stabbing Westward’s 1999 cover of the song. The kick rhythm is classic four-on-the-floor. Consequently, we move the song differently.
Now that we’ve established the importance of the kick drum, let’s go over some methods for using the kick.
The Basics:
Burying the Beater – Using the foot pedal of the kick is a combination of hip and calf muscles. It’s not an aggressive foot tap (as I did for the first couple years of playing drums.) Using your calf to raise your foot while swinging your hip slightly forward to assist, bring your full force of your foot down so that the beater hits the the head of the drum. Keep it there, notice how the lack of resonance puts the emphasis on the attack of the kick.
Heartbeat Release – Now try the same thing while releasing the beater from the head of the drum after your stroke. Notice how the resonance lends a warmer, fuller character to kick hit.
Double Trouble – This is a little tricky, but you’ll be able to do it in time! For double kick hits, start with your foot further back on the pedal. Right after you stroke, slide forward on the pedal using the ball of your foot to commence another stroke. This will take some practice before you’re up to speed, but you’ll soon be able to produce super-fast double kick strokes using this method.
Some Basic Rhythms
Now that we have some handle on grip, stroke, and using the foot pedal, let’s go over a few rudimentary drum patterns. Please note that as we haven’t gone over opening and closing the hi-hat pedal, these patterns below reflect either open (foot off the pedal) or closed (foot fully on the pedal.) But experiment away!
2 Beat – The most simple backing beat there is includes steady quarter notes on a closed hi-hat. Now alternate between 1-2-3-4 on the kick and drum respectively. You’ll soon realize you’ve got the backing beat to several pop hits, including “You Make My Dreams Come True” by Hall and Oates.
Four on the Floor – Whereas the 2 beat had you alternating kick and snare, now add the kick to each quarter note, joining the snare on beats 2 and 4. After familiarizing yourself with this, now bring in the hi-hat, only at double speed this time to give you eighth notes. There you go, you can play in any New York indie band. Now if you really want to get rock and roll with it, add a kick hit to the “and of” (eighth note succeeding) 3. Now you’ve got most of chart-topping drum patterns under your belt.
12/8 – As this is a time signature and a pattern per sé, there are several patterns you can attempt. For simplicity’s sake, let’s start with the simple four on the floor pattern we learned before. But this time, count to 12 on your hi-hat rather than 8 (or to 6 two times if that’s easier.) Then add the kick on beats 1 and 4 (then 7 and 10.) Now add the snare to beats 4 and 10. You’ve graduated to the world of triplet meter, congratulations!
Fermata
Learning the drums can be both incredibly difficult and isolating. By the very nature of the instrument, people will probably want you to be alone while you practice and play for hours on end. Yet you’re not alone. For as much as bands are worth nowadays, a band is nothing without its drummer. And the feeling of playing music with others is one of the most sublime experiences there is. So don’t get discouraged on your journey.
There are bright, talented people out there just like you who are seeking to hone their drum skills. The video creator I linked to throughout this article, Jeff Randall, makes great content for practicing drummers. The most important aspect of practicing drums is to remain encouraged, inspired, and learning at your own pace. After all, it’s all about rhythm.
Are you trying to learn the drums and have a question about practice? We hope this helps you learn how to play drums better! Leave a comment below!
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