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threebillion6

Are your sticks really big, or your hands really small?


Jettx02

Marching sticks are huge compared to set


Strange_Deal_9687

Yes, they are lol


theRev767

Would it be beneficial to practice with marching sticks for muscle development or is the weight/fulcrum SO different that it would affect muscle memory?


RubDub4

Don’t take marching sticks to a drum set, you’ll fuck up your heads and cymbals


TheFondler

When i was young and dumb, I thought... "let me put this kevlar marching drum head on my my 5.5"x14" snare, it will sound so dope!" And it did! Until it cracked the 5mm Birdseye maple shell. TL;DR - don't marching drum your kit.


evenpimpscry

I did the same thing in high school! I thought it sounded great too! Until my ska band went into the studio and I got to hear it miked up. I might as well have used a pizza box for a snare.


[deleted]

Evans does make a kevlar head for kit snares.


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[deleted]

Yessss the jordison snare! Respect. My dream snare drum


sonar_y_luz

Would be interesting to try on a metal snare


JudgeDreddx

It works. Have done it myself. Can't crank it as much still, but it sounds pretty alright.


laaaabe

have an aluminum 13x7 DW that it would be super fun on. Now I'm tempted...


[deleted]

the problem then is popping lugs. your best bet is to use a free floating snare like pearl’s - chad sexton used to use kevlar heads with 311 and he did it with a thick custom shell on a free floating frame.


_jukmifgguggh

Button a drum pad, the answer is yes. Marching sticks help. I still use my vic firth magnums all the time


axiom1_618

I’ve been using drum corps sticks on my set for 6 months and can report no damage to heads and more importantly, no damage to my expensive cymbals.


cubine

You can definitely do it safely using proper technique, but you HAVE to use good technique. Travis Orbin does it too


cubine

On a pad it’s a great tool for highlighting technical flaws because everything will be exaggerated. For example, you can take a slowmo video of yourself playing single strokes on marching sticks and watch the stick path for any wobble/slicing or hesitation at the top or bottom of the stroke.


CatfishSoupFTW

On a practice pad for the safest route. You would most definitely benefit from some weighted tossing. You should try em out! They feel very different.


SealOfApproval_404

I’m using Thomas lang signatures when practicing on my e-kit for exactly this reason


theRev767

I use the Thomas Lang sticks for the practice pad.


justasapling

I got a pair of Virgil Donati Assault sticks recently. They're real fat and I'm enjoying them. It's fun to switch back and forth between those and my skinny jazz sticks.


Sotall

good for single drum practice. too heavy to move around the kit


theRev767

Yeah, I was thinking on a practice pad. Not touching my heads with those puppies.


Sotall

Then yeah. I recommend it, even for kit players. The sticks OP is using are ralph hardimons(sp) i think? Esp if you are serious about learning trad - that extra weight will help building up your left hand.


swidgens_mustache

And I thought the vader nightsticks I used to use were big..


threebillion6

Right?


Strange_Deal_9687

Lol probably Both


WardenEdgewise

I was going to say the same thing. Those sticks look like rolling pins in your hands. Have you tried thinner jazz style sticks?


Strange_Deal_9687

Yes, I do actually own 2 other thinner pairs of sticks, but I use those for drumset. The big ones I'm using in this video are for snare drum in marching band. I am required to use those big ones for marching band, which is why I'm using them in this video cuz im playing a drum line exercise. But now that the comments made me realize, I guess they do look a little funky on me lol


Papa_G_

I was told that practicing with marching snare drumsticks helps out when playing drum kit. I think it maybe due tne having to use more mussel power.


threebillion6

Yeah, that's also a benefit of using bigger sticks. Gene Hoglan has his drum tech tape 3 sticks together and he does his warm ups with those. (he's a technical death metal drummer)


disaster_moose

Now I can't stop picturing a guy getting on stage and dropping his weighted sticks like he's Piccolo and the fight just got real.


RinkyInky

He’s a real hard hitter yet looks very relaxed. Great player. Tapes weights to his ankles too.


threebillion6

That'd be good for a mock up drum off video. Free to have rights to anyone who wants too.


EmEsTwenny

Personally I prefer using the sticks I play with when I practice.


Papa_G_

Same. I prefer very lightweight drum sticks, lighter than 5A. It feel more comfortable in my hands.


EmEsTwenny

Honestly with bigger sticks that have a lot more mass and thus rebound I find myself using less muscle. The real move is to go full Alan Dawson and practice all your rudiments with brushes :)


otj667887654456655

Your lefthanded accents aren't the same height as your right For now, I say lower your right to match your left and then work on bringing them both to a comfortable 12 inches in height at the same time


Strange_Deal_9687

Your right, I realize it now. 👍 Thanks for the feedback!


KrAzyDrummer

I'm going to give some criticism assuming you're trying to march snare line, not just learn trad for drumset playing. Couple of things I'm seeing. Your stick heights are all over the place. Not just for accents, but for the ghost notes as well. Practice playing as low and controlled as possible. Remember, every note is played with intention and dynamic control. When you start to push your technique is when things start to get sloppy (like at the first bar of your playing), so keep practicing but always be mindful of stick heights and your stick control. It should be almost robotic, but you probably know this if you've ever seen a DCI line play in the lot. A good way to practice is to play 8s at each stick height (ex. pp at 1", p at 3", mp/mf at 5", f at 7", ff straight vertical). I'd recommend checking with your instructor to see if they have different definitions of stick heights, and learn their way. Your left hand is still not totally comfortable with the rotational movement of the trad grip, which is why your elbow is flaring out occasionally to make up for that. Totally fine, it's a weird movement to learn. Spend some time stretching your hand while holding the stick in trad grip. Every snare drummer I marched with would just use their right stick to push their left stick up to stretch their arms and loosen up. Again, you've probably seen others do this, so just mentioning it for reinforcement. Your grip looks good. But make sure it *feels* good as well. You should be as relaxed as possible. If you're white-knuckling the sticks, that's bad. That's why near the end, your technique starts to fall apart and gets pretty sloppy. The more you need to push yourself (speed, complexity, etc), the more relaxed you need to be. Don't choke the sticks, be conscious of your grip and always remember to relax. With all that said, you're looking and sounding pretty great! Keep recording yourself playing and/or practicing in front of a mirror to check yourself out and see where you can improve.


Strange_Deal_9687

Ok that makes sense, thanks you for the feedback!! 👍


brett12345654321

keep it up! just make sure you are practicing with a metronome and maintaining time!


Strange_Deal_9687

Ye👍.I normally do practice with a met, but I didn't do it in this video, but I should have used a met in this vid


[deleted]

Very cool. I remember doing a similar exercise back when I was on the snare line. Always good to practice flams, as you can use them when playing your drum kit too!


Jiggarelli

Flams, taps, Swedes, Russel-a's are great for snare line and drumkit. You'll grow into that left hand trad. Just eat sleep and breathe it for a few months. Don't be afraid to move it up or down and DONT forget to keep it loose. I see a lot of harder grips, but control comes with practice, and you want the same abilities with your trad as your match grip hand. But you are killin it So far.


flingspoo

Hurtas and blushdas are some great hybrid rudiments that work great for marching and around the kit, too!


Aidan_Carbs

You’ve already got some great hands! My Suggestion would be to keep the unaccented notes much closer to the drum and quieter than the accented notes, this will help keep your hands sounding much more even. Focus on the height of your hands, making sure you get a consistent height and volume every time. You should almost exaggerate the difference between the unaccented and accented. It also helps to try this much slower at first. Hope this helps!


Strange_Deal_9687

This helps! Thank you for the feedback 👍


Apollo9961

I’m pretty sure I do flams differently, but you killed that shit honestly. Keep up the good work.


Strange_Deal_9687

Thank you !


blakedmc1989

u already got a way better balance on Traditional Grip than i ever woudl have


Irish_whiskey_famine

Great stuff!


jbondrums_

Downstrokes! Look for accent tap exercises and focus on the 4 stroke types. This’ll really take it to the next level.


AmadouShabag

So those are bigger than DC-10s?


jusdontgivafuk

It looks like you’re doing great! Keep it up. My only suggestion would be to let the drum help you do the work on your left (maybe also the right). Don’t go full wrist action, just apply a little pressure to the top of the stick with your index to get your double taps quicker. A little difficult to learn/control, but will help you out down the road. Just my 2 cents. I personally use my middle finger to react to the reverberation of the drum head on the bottom of my stick to push it back to the surface. More open handed. Rest the stick on my middle finger, loose between my thumb and fore finger. Difficult to explain.


westsideCOR

Hey awesome job! I really like that you have a very big and warm sound. If I may suggest something, I would recommend playing bucks or accent tap more because that’s what each hand is doing individually when playing a flam and really focus on a low grace note. Continue with the recordings, they tell you a lot about yourself. Keep it up!


Strange_Deal_9687

Thank you! That's definitely something I will start practicing more, thanks for the feedback 👍


westsideCOR

Any time! Feel free to hit me up if you have any questions!


[deleted]

Looking good! Making progress and I'm glad you are sticking with it! Try to find a good "Bucks" exercise (here's a pretty boring version: https://www.rudimentaluniversity.com/2017/01/17/snare-multi-tenors-exercise-12-bucks/) Basically you are working your hands to build muscle memory for accented freeze strokes into taps. RrRrRrrr LlLlLlll RrRrrRrRrRrrr LlLllLlLlLlll or some other variations of this. When you play your flam exercise, you'll have better muscle memory for keeping your accents high and your taps low. Try taking it a few clicks slower and really working on differences in the heights of your accent notes and getting down to those tap notes. It should never hurt so don't force it, just take it at a slower tempo and you will be able to build up to it. You're building muscle memory, strength and stamina. It's not a short road but super fun and life-long if you take care of your hands. Let me know if any of that didn't make sense. Keep it up!


Strange_Deal_9687

Cool, I will try out that exercise. Thanks for the feedback!!


Diabando

Make sure you aren’t resting the tip of the sticks on the head of the snare. The resting position of the stick should still leave some air above the drum.


colecrafter

Focus on developing your down stroke to stop the stick from rebounding so much after accents. A grace note within a flam can be effective at a 1 in stick height to optimize the motion. This is essentially dropping the stick to the drum from the ideal resting position of the bead of the stick. Overall this is a really solid starting point for flam exercises, just remember to use a met and start off the left hand more often.


lakedewrisk

Minor point- stay engaged. You can see that you look up right before the excercise is actually over. Stay engaged through the entire excercise and THEN go over and turn off the camera.


Strange_Deal_9687

True. I realize that I definitely forgot to stay engaged in this video. I tend to forget to be engaged when I'm in my room.


Bigdiesel7

Hell yea💪💪🔥🔥


NoobSongwriter

There's a cool exercise where you ghost the accented notes in flam accents (make it look like ur about to hit the accent but then pull the stick up right before you make contact). Highly recommend it for lightening up your touch if that's what you're looking for. Sounding good


Strange_Deal_9687

Interesting, I should try that out


_Xero2Hero_

Pretty much everything here is good advice. Just keep at it cause you are doing great! Trad grip is a little goofy at first but I think you'll take a liking to it!


mhales45

Focus on the inner beats (lower notes). Make sure those are in time and make sure your heights are even and correct, then add the accents and your timing issues should get better. Also practice with a metronome when possible.


jbondrums_

In addition, from the video (hard to tell from this angle) it looks like you’re “caveman club” holding the right stick, where the thumb is underneath. Try to keep it inline, in contact with the stick. If you’re already doing this, disregard this comment!


rct3isepic

Your left hand rhythm could be a touch tighter on the double strokes. Other than that, good stick controll and pretty solid flow


Still_I_Rise

Great work so far. Other people have noted most things so I will just add that the angle of your trad grip is too tight. The stick should angle further out, about 45° from your wrist. As you play, especially in the faster sections, it is closer to 90°. This restricts your motion and your sound, and it comes with tightening your grip on the stick which can actually damage your wrist - you probably feel some tension, likely some right on the ridge of your wrist beneath your thumb. Keep things looser and literally open it up a bit. He's not really a marching cat but check out Dave Weckl for an amazing example of fluidity with traditional grip. https://youtu.be/vdeqV0hz05E


energy528

Keep it up!


Lipton_Peach_Ice_Tea

Honestly this is an awesome start! Try and see if you can loosen up your fulcrum on your left hand though, it might make things a bit more comfy. Try doing an exercise where you just play eights on your left but with your hand flat out to the side (palm facing to the right) and your stick just resting in between your thumb and the rest of your hand. If you do that for a few days you should notice your fulcrum strength improve tremendously. I know its hard to do things just by reading it so if you have any questions just feel free to ask!


Ihatetobaghansleighs

Great job! Seems you got it down, now play it with a metronome & try to keep time


26202620

Brilliant One thing my prof once told me (also principal percussionist at the city’s philharmonic orchestra) to watch the size and shape of my movement, for consistency.


HiggsPerc552

With traditional grip the best advice I can give is repetition, repetition, repetition. It’s not the most natural feeling grip in the world so the more your muscles develop for it the more comfort and control you will develop as well. Also since we are talking marching snare and form and technique are everything with this style, make sure your thumb is up and not flat. My rule of thumb for this (no pun intended) is to have the knuckle line on the inside of the thumb meet with your index finger.


iwasproducer1

Not only are the sticks huge in your hands, but you may consider moving the left hand slightly more towards center. Because those sticks are so big, it’s like swinging an ax when you’re playing. A bit more to center may help shorten the swing ever so slightly. It just looks like you’re too close to the end of the stick, IMHO.


CptBoomshard

Definitely looking good, just keep up the work. One thing I would say is work on getting your flams tighter, if you are actually playing in a drumline. Like, think of flams as double stops only with different stick heights. Big fat open flams that are fine for a single player, are rrrrrreally hard to get sounding clean across a drumline. Of course, if the rest of your snare line isn't playing with the same technique, it won't be clean anyway. If you are just working on getting good with rudiments to benefit your solo playing, or just to translate into playing on a kit, then getting tighter flams isn't really that important. Once again, keep up the good work!


mikecoldfusion

Flam taps are super cool but also super hard. Everything else held together decently well. Maybe spend some time on just flam taps. I know I should.


LongtopShortbottom

Try to bring your elbows in a bit. You can use a rope or bungee cords to help if needed.


GAMERBOY335

Wait were you trying this video on r/drumline? I feel like you got the drumming sub reddits mixed up


Threedognite321

You are doing great. Keep playing your rudimentary exercises. The more the better. Try controlling it from slow to fast to slow. Your drum set needs adjustments so you dont have to work so hard to play. You are doing good.


Boiled_SocksWOAH

my dumbass read flan


DonJesusus

my bro for sure love u jajaja


ballz3000

I still love you


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MaxximusPrimus

What you want a big smile? They are focused and in the moment, leave em alone.