Drum Lesson #6
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Todays lesson will be having a fitness theme. Now just as any repeative motion will cause prolonged physical pain, so too does playing drums. I can not emphasis enough the importance of playing with your palms down. Except for the real technical aspect of having your palms facing each other while your drums sticks are hit's their intendead surface. One example of this is when you need both hands to go exactly together off off a crash or ride cymbal for each hand, keeping the beat and coming down on the snare at the same time. This is not something for the studio unless it was needed. Where it works great is like at the open mike night.
Moving along... Drummers wear themselves down by not using their bodies in an intelligent way. Listen, just like exercise you have to streach your wrists out. You have to use your fingers instead of your arms all night long. Heck you may even have to do a half hour of muscle streaches in between the time your body is practing. You play for so long like an hour or so and your body is tired. You then do like the kind of muscles streaches gymnasts would do for like a half hour or an hour or so. When I used to teach drums. Every single exersized I showed to a student could required either 2 hours or an entire day to practice. Teaching drums is like taking drum lessons from one to five different instructors per week and practcing whatever "new stuff." your students need to learn. You just have to excute the exersize as fast as a machine gun. You look like Neal Pert of Rush. Once you do that then you WON'T HAVE TO PRACTICE IT SO HARD when you show the next student. Or perform at an open mike night so you can try to gain new students. Just because you reading drum lessons doen't mean real instructors aren't important. The styles of music are as numerous as the styles of martial arts. One style is hitting the stick with each finger below the index finger, so it snaps the drum stick between that finger and the palm of your hand. This works best when the butt of the stick ( Opposite of the tip at the top.) is positioned by the lines of your wrists. Remember to ensure your drum stick does not slide out of your hand there shuld be a gap between your thumb and index finger graspiong the stick. Like holding A HAMMER your other side of the drum stick should be resting on either the fist line or under knucle of your index finger or resting in that space in beween that one and your second knuckle. So your thumb knuckle may have to be bend to ensure it's resting in the right place. Tug at your drums stick with the other hand really hard. If it stays firm, your on the right track. From this position if you take all the other fingers in unison andact like a one hand clap, the stick will move faster than your wrist. Again, like playing a piano use each individual finger until you stick can go as fast as all the fingers pushing the butt end of the stick towards your palm and relase then back so it can be repeated. Your pinch point between the thumb and knucle under your finger nail shall make the drum into a fulcrum. Push the butt end of the stick towards your palm and the tip of the stick hits the drum. Hence the fingers are relaxed and almost dangleing off the butt end of the stick. As the fingers tighten it's grip and move the stick towards the palm like a one hand clap, then it snaps so the tip hits the drum. Relax the grip so the three (or intended one finger,) is holding the energy end of the fulcrum. Hence the stick would be resting on the tips of either all three fingers under the pinch point or the one finger being used. Then the tip of the stick is off the surface being hit. Close up the fist so ther finger tip pressed the stick to your palm then the tip snaps quickly to hit the surface.
Now your wrist shoud bend the stick down. Your wrist over extends itself by lifting up. The correct method is like watching the old martial arts films and they say the crane style and thier writst bend. Like how a crane bends it's knee while standing on the other foot. That's the proper way. Incorrectly is when your writsts are striaght they must lift up over extended to lift the tip of the drum stick hiogh enough for an adaquant hit. It's like lifting your palms striaght uo to the audience. Look at how over extended your wrists are. Over time this is so painfull! So the correct way is to have your elbows down low . Then at the wrists bend down and your hand looks like some sort of snake shadow puppet with the tip of the drum stick resting on the surface of say your snare drum. Now when you straighten out your wrists they are ablut at the same height as theo other way around. Then wrong way described above You know the way that causes tendonituis. Start with your writst bent so when you staighten you wrists the stick goes off the drum high enough so it sound good when it comes down. If you do have to over extend your wrist at this position, it wil sound louder that doing it the other way around. That reason is using your arm ike a whip to maximize loudness. Then your wrists have to over extend themselves.
For this move your elbow from the low position. lift you elbow and let the rest of you are stay stationary until you have to lift it. However you want your arm to always be below your elbow until your elbow is raised over you head. Then you bring your elbow down like you are making a hand signal for a right turn on a bicycle. Then your wirst is above the stick until it whips down to hit the drum. Until then it's small circle whips on your elbows. Your inner wrists for keeping the palms down and then the fingers. On a future lesson we will talk about the ankles and doing streches for your wrisits and ankles.