Get yer paradiddles out. It’s drum fill of the week #74!
Watch fill of the week #74 on instagram.
This week’s drum fill sees us combining the humble paradiddle with some single strokes to create a great sounding drum fill. This drum fill is great if you’re starting to work on incorporating paradiddles into your drum fills. Let’s get to it!
Learn The Fill
Let’s start by looking at the sticking pattern we’ll be using for this drum fill.
The sticking pattern for the drum fill is two single paradiddles (RLRRLRLL) followed by single strokes for the remainder of the bar. Practice this pattern first before moving on to the next step. Can you move smoothly between the paradiddles and the singles?
Our next, and final, step is to orchestrate this around the kit. I like to play paradiddles with accents on the right hand single strokes – R L R R L R L L – this is a pattern I use a lot. Here I put the first accent (beat 1) on the Floor Tom and the second accent (“e” of 2) on First Tom. Feel free to move that around as you see fit.
For the singles strokes, I went with one of my favourite orchestrations – three 16th notes on the Snare, three on the First Tom and the last two on the Floor Tom. It’s a combination that always sounds good. Here’s the full drum fill:
Take It Further
Let’s take the chance to cement this use of the paradiddle into your playing and increase your drum fill vocabulary at the same time. Here’s three more drum fills using the same sticking pattern and the exact same paradiddle usage; we’re just going to change the ending.
All three drum fills use common patterns at the end. Hopefully you can play these with ease. Once you’re done with those, create some of your own endings.
If you’d like to take it further still, try swapping the singles and the paradiddles around – singles first and then paradiddles:
R-L-R-L-R-L-R-L-R-L-R-R-L-R-L-L
Keep the paradiddle pattern the same as in the original fill and add your own single stroke ideas to it.
I hope you’ve enjoyed fill of the week #74. If you’re in Singapore and you’d like a free trial drum lesson, send us a message via the contact us page.