Mike Mangini holds the world record for the fastest drummer with an incredible 1203-minute stroke. This is 20 strokes per second!
If this makes you feel awkward about your drumming speed, then it’s time to get on the stool and practice! To benefit from being able to play fast, you don’t need to be a legendary drummer in death metal.
Many styles, from Latin to jazz, can blow your mind and challenge you as a musician. Once they are mastery, they will be a source of pride. Finding the right teacher to help you get to where you want to go is important. Click to find out more about education and lessons.
Here are some exercises and tips to help you improve your hand-eye coordination and break the sound barrier like the pros. Let’s get started!
The Rudiments
Always begin with the rudiments. You may be familiar with 26 basic drumming patterns and the rudiments. These are the foundation skills you need to improve your technique, control, speed, and most importantly, your technique.
This tip is the most important: Learn the basics at a comfortable pace before you try to accelerate. As with all instruments, learning the drums is about getting your body to do a task. A large part of that is the “feel”. It would help if you learned the basics of the drums first. Otherwise, you will be training your body not to do the right thing faster.
Exercises
Okay, let’s move on to the best: the meat and potatoes. First, some important notes. These exercises should be performed regularly as a warmup. Although adding these exercises to your routine may take some time, you will soon notice a greater comfort level at higher tempos.
Loose hands / Single stroke rolls
Ever seen someone attempt something that takes time and coordination but then gets tight and tight when they go to do it? This is often due to nervousness or overthinking.
Loosen up – drummers can’t be so uptight, man. We must keep our feet on the ground if we want to be able to perform all those strokes. Get loose and do single-stroke rolls.
One stroke per hand will be alternated with a kick on each of the 1, 2 and 3 (it’s 4:1). You’re playing techno music. Kick and left snare one hand, left stick to snare two hands, kick on three, right stick grab on two and continue for the second half. It’s all about technique. Keep your hands up, and don’t flame on the hits.
Double Stroke Rolls
Okay, we will repeat the previous pattern but double the snare hits. You will do this by going kick and right stick, snare, on the 1 and 2, respectively. Then, you’ll go left stick snare, kick, on the offbeat and left stick snare again on the 2.
Triplets
Now that we have some basic time exercises down let’s get our triplet skills up to date. While the time signature is not changed, you will hit three snares using alternating sticks for each beat. It will kick and right stick snare on one beat, followed by 2 additional right stick swings to create a triplet. The second beat will see you hitting the snare with the left stick in a triplet. You can continue the measure with the kick remaining on the first and third beats.
Paradiddle
Diddle diddle, get back on the drum set. It’s time for paradiddle. This is a simple, fun exercise that is easy to do. The name is also silly. This is straight time again (4:4). It will be a coordination game.
You will follow this pattern with every hit of the 16th note: Right, Left. Right, Right. Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Repeat. Although it sounds simple, increasing speed can make it almost impossible for your body to keep up. You will notice a significant improvement in speed and coordination if you slow it down.