Friday, August 8, 2008

Art Avila, Promark Sticks endorsed, brings a new drum lesson to Badassdrumming

August 2008

Art Avila, endorsed by Promark Sticks and Badassdrumming.com, has delivered a doozy of a workout to try called X-BOX Template. This is a workout everyone can benefit from. Click the name to see it.

This thing is just sick. Cheeses, flams, flam drags, flam 5's, diddles, pataflaflas, Swiss Army Triplets and more. This is a non-ending workout for any drummer out there.

Become a member of www.badassdrumming.com for free and get more of this from Art and our other endorsed drummers.


Match Grip vs. Conventional Grip - Which is correct?

Match Grip vs. Conventional Grip - Which is correct?

Hello and no, this is not a battle of one grip over the other. This has to do with current practices that are not ergonomically friendly. The rising number of drummers within the past 15 to 20 years that have had drumming related injuries is well beyond the numbers of generations prior. Let's take a look at some of the possible reasons.

The most common injury is Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, an injury of the tendons. This comes from several things.
1. Lack of stretching and warming up before playing.
2. Bad grip or grip technique
3. Bad motion of the wrist/arm

Let's start with stretching. It is a necessary instrument prior to performing. The cold tendons and muscles need time to get into playing condition. Getting good blood flow to the limbs is necessary, too. With the blood/oxygen flow the limbs are now prepared to handle the stress they are about to take on. Without stretching you are placing those limbs into an At-risk of injury.

Next is bad grip. With any job your goal is to expel to least amount of energy and get maximum results. I call it the 'play smart, not hard' theory. Think of like a major purchase. If you can get that big flat screen TV at one store for $1400.00 and the same TV is at another store for $890.00 of course you'll go for the $890.00 deal.

Well, drumming should be the same way. Spend less energy and get the same product. This is where alot of energy is wasted, the grip. If you are not working with the stick's fulcrum (balance point) you are already fighting a lost cause. Second, gripping the stick like a club will tire your hand out. You want a loose grip just barely keeping the stick between the fingers. I tell my students to think of using the friction of the skin only to hold the stick in place, fingers lightly wrapped around the stick.

Now, since we are here on grip next would be what is the right grip. This is going to depend on the angle of the drum. If the drum is flat in front of you then match grip would be best for this drum position. Shoulders, elbows, forearms and wrists are all symmetrical and balanced. This would be ergonomically correct or in harmony with the body.

If the drum is tilted with the left side of the rim up and right side down then conventional grip is ergonamically correct. This grip was designed for field military drummers because the drum hung on a sling and tilted in the process. So the conventional grip was designed just for that. Later adoption to using it on flat field drums has led to more injuries and a player that is ergonamically out of balance. One shoulder is higher, one elbow in vs. the other out and the degree of twist in the left arm from the elbow forward. With this in mind, the spine also twists a little to help compensate for this position. This is not good at all on any marching player. The same goes for any sitting player behind a drumset.

So a marcher playing on a flat drum should be using match grip and this goes for sitting drummers with the snare flat in front of you or tilted toward you. On to bad motion of the wrists/arms.

There are times when a player gets tired and the gig isn't over. What happens? They tighten up. They start holding their breath. They start twisting the wrist in an awkward way. They start using more arm and less fingers ... it becomes an increasing stress to the player because they react in the opposite way they should. With the arms and wrists now reacting in the wrong way the player has increased the risk of injury. The player needs to relax, check their stick grip and their breathing. Any other bad motions, like slouching, will correct itself once you start to relax.

We covered some possible causes of injuries that the player can immediately correct. Let's look at just a few other things real quick that may cause injury.

Let's look at all of the things a percussionist has to strike and how. First, there are nearly an endless amounts of surfaces a player strikes from plastic, metal, wood, resins, composites, calfskins, cowhide, sheepskin, etc. And the choices to strike them from the hand to sticks/mallets to shaking. The gammot is wide open. How dense or soft the material is will also play in the effect on how we strike it and the repercussion it creates.

Todays marching snare drum has gone through many changes over the years in materials but still have these things in common; it's a round shell with heads, has hoops and snares mounted across the bottom head. Todays units are are built tighter and lighter than their predeceasors of 20 or 30 years ago. Torquing the top head, now made of Kevlar, is one design I question. The snare now sounding like a piece of masonite and such high tone doesn't carry far. So to compensate drummers have to play harder to get louder and when that's not enough the director needs to add more snares to the section. So, striking a torqued surface made of Kevlar with a Hickory drumstick ... what does that do to the player's arms? The repercussion (shock) of the strike will send back through the stick to the hand/arm a wave that is bound to have some effect to the player.

I mentioned other materials like metal (cymbals, gongs, bells, chimes, vibraphone ...), wood (woodblock, headless tambourine, marimba, bass drum hoops, cajon ...), resins (xylophone, graphite blocks ...) plastics (tambourine ...), different skins (bongos, congas, doumbek, djembe ...) and even vegetables (gourds, guiro ...) and clay pots (gourd variations, platas ...). Each of these have different methods of holding and striking. There is no doubt that the hand drums will have the most impact on your body overall. Care must be taken to insure the least possible amount of injury. Learning the correct techniques in holding and striking all of these instruments is essential.

Kenneth Ray Sword Jr
www.badassdrumming.com

Thursday, August 7, 2008

Drummers are far better in percentages than football players and doctors.

Drummers are far better in percentages than football players and doctors.

Someone will surely say this is obsured but think about it for a moment. Athletes, making millions of dollars, do not obtain 100% efficiency of their sport. It's just not possible. Look at doctors. They get paid to practice their field. WHAT? Musicians have to practice on their own and are expected to perform perfectly, EVERYTIME! I just don't get it.

Ray Sword

The Importance of Paradiddles

The Importance of Paradiddles

I want to take a moment to stress the importance of this rudiment. In the book Percussion Manual Second Edition by the author of F. Michael Combs [ISBN 1-57766-106-0] printed by Waveland Press, Inc. on page 79 of section II. B. is a list of rudiments (most diddle rudiments from the original NARD 26 Rudiments) that Mr. Combs claims are Unessential (rarely necessary). I tend to differ here. I am not sure why he says this but after much study of this rudiment there are too many benefits to having this rudiment in your arsenal.

Looking at the paradiddle the first note is accented followed by an alternate hand of lesser volume and followed by the starting hand with two strokes of the same volume as the opposite hand. Just the fact of sticking going from alternate to doubles over and over builds oneself for better independence and the accent placed on the first note of every four is another training exercise. Along with the other variations of diddles, including diddles containing flams and drags, makes for a superior workout and alternate sticking methods to keep a multi-percussionist from getting tangled up.

Think of master stick control in overdrive. Alternates and double strokes with accents and flams and drags (ruffs). The stick control of Accents, regular stroke and grace (or ghost) notes all present in one rudiment. So here is where I validate the importance of this rudiment.

In section C on the same page of his book he goes on to list additional rudiments from the PAS International Drum Rudiments list. #7 The Single Paradiddle-diddle. #8 Single Flammed Mill. #13. Single Dragadiddle. Now, PAS has recognized these rudiments since they are overwhelmingly used rudiments in competition and in marching drumlines so if the true fundamental rudiment is discredited by being called unessential (rarely necessary) then wouldn’t that lend to saying the same to these hybrids of the same rudiment family? So, I say all diddle rudiments are important and pretty cool to play, too.

Kenneth Ray Sword Jr

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Free MP3's, Discounts on Drums and more

Hello %name%,

Thought I would give you the latest on what's up at Badassdrumming.com.

We finally have deals running with Music123, Musician's Friend, Napster and mTraks so you can get some great deals and save you money.

You need music to practice to, tunes to add to your set list or whether to just enjoy, both, Napster and mTraks are giving our members some really good deals to try them out.

Napster is giving a 7 day free trial to over 6 million songs.

mTraks is giving away 30 Free MP3's for just signing up.

3 Ways to Take Advantage of Back to School Savings at Music123!

We're sending students back to school in style. Our Back to School Savings offers
you three amazing ways to take advantage of the back to school season.
Through this promotion you can take 15% off on hundreds of top brands,
get a free music stand and Music123 80th anniversary t-shirt with any band and
orchestra purchase over $99 and recieve double points for the entire month. Going
back to school has never been better.

And ...

Up to 50% Off and Free Shipping at the Music123 Outlet Store!
Our Outlet Store is slashing prices up to 50% on top name brands such as Gibson,
Yamaha, Fender and many, many more. Along with these rocking deals we're also
offering you free shipping on orders over $99. This rocking duo of deals
will leave you cheering for more.

Just go to www.badassdrumming.com and look for any of the links. They are all around so they are easy to find.

We also have a new page that is in conjunction with Musician's Friend bring you the 'Snare of the Week'. Links have been placed on the left column of each page for easy access. See what's new and in review.

And, finally, we have access to many of the authentic concert memorabilia, T-shirts and collectibles of many artists known today. The Who, Lynard Skynard, Maroon 5, Dream Theatre, Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, Poison, Def Leppard, Coldplay, Billy Joel, KISS, Gene Simmons and many more.

You can find this at any Fan's Collectibles link within the site and on the main page.

As you see, we're working to make this your site for all of your music and drumming needs.

Keep swingin',

Sword