Haven’t played drums in a while so I strung together a bunch of metronome exercises to do on my practice pad. I really want to keep the speed between my left and right hand balanced out. To be frank, I haven’t received any formal drumming training so my names for rudiments might be off; the benefits should be the same. (Side note: I prefer the traditional grip, but I try to master the exercises with matched grip as well before I increase the BPM speed.)
If you want to really benefit from these exercises, start slow (80 BPM) and watch your strokes in a mirror or a video recording. Be honest with yourself, if your timing is spot-on, increase the BPM by 5 and work through them again. I’m going 90 BPM in the recording and I’m still too sloppy to move up to 95.
Everything is in 16th notes! And accents are in parentheses.
Alternating Single Strokes
RLRL RLRL RLRL RLRL
LRLR LRLR LRLR LRLR
“One Two’s”
(R)LL(R) LL(R)L L(R)LL (R)LL(R)
(L)RR(L) RR(L)R R(L)RR (L)RR(L)
Accented Paradiddles
(R)LRR (L)RLL (R)LRR (L)RLL
(L)RLL (R)LRR (L)RLL (R)LRR
Double Diddles
RRLL RRRR LLRR LLLL
LLRR LLLL RRLL RRRR
Buddy Triples (because Buddy Rich liked to “roll” his snare with one hand doing this very quickly)
(R)LLL (R)LLL (R)LLL (R)LLL
(L)RRR (L)RRR (L)RRR (L)RRR
Four on Each Hand
(R)RRR (L)LLL (R)RRR (L)LLR
(L)LLL (R)RRR (L)LLL (R)RRL
Then you go back up, Buddy Triples, Double Diddles, Accented Paradiddles, until the top, and then go back down. Get comfortable switching between stickings. You can go in whatever order you want, but the benefit to this combination is that you practice switching between rudiments. Don’t just do paradiddles for hours on end!
