It’s 2021! Happy New Year! Here’s a fill featuring 21 notes. Enjoy!
Watch drum fill of the week #78 on instagram
This week’s drum fill crams 21 notes into a bar of 4/4 by using 16th note and 8th note triplets. For more fun with 16th note triplets check out drum fill of the week #68.
Learn The Fill
Let’s check out the basic pattern for this week’s fill.
For this week’s drum fill we are playing a 6 note grouping – R-L-R-L-R-K – 3 times in a row. We are playing it over the 16th note triplet subdivision so there are no funny timing issues or polyrhythmic elements – each group starts on the beat.
For beat 4, we’re playing 8th note triplets to give a dramatic ending to a busy fill. Timing might be an issue for some here. Make sure those last 3 notes are evenly spaced. If you’re having trouble counting it as written above. You can try counting just the 8th note triplets and feeling the 16th notes inbetween – this might help get the last 3 notes more even.
Once you have the timing sorted out, all that remains is the orchestration. Here’s the orchestration I used:
My right hand plays the snare, tom 2 and floor tom, my left hand plays the hi-hat and tom 1. Focus on playing the 16th note triplet group slowly and smoothly before speeding it up. Be sure to count!
Taking It Further
As always, when I spend time learning a drum fill, I always like to take the basic idea of the drum fill and find as many ways as I can to orchestrate it around the kit. Here’s 3 more ways to play this drum fill. See if you can find some of your own.
The first variation is very similar to the original. I’ve just substituted Tom 1 for Tom 2. This makes the drum fill work for 2 tom tom drum kits.
The second variation leaves the hi-hat and focuses on moving around the toms.
The final variation changes the 6 note groups further to start with the floor tom. The ending is also changed to give a slightly bigger sound.
I hope you’ve enjoyed drum fill of the week #78. If you’re in Singapore and you’d like a free trial lesson, send us a message via the contact us page.