For this drum lesson I’m going to teach you some awesome four-stroke ruff fills using the bass drum. I first saw this technique when I was in the army band at Ft. Drum, New York. I watched one of my friends practicing one day and saw him doing these type of fills. He showed me how to play them and I’ve been incorporating them into my playing ever since.
A four-stroke ruff consists of three quick grace notes, followed by the main note. When you play this rudiment on the snare drum, all three notes are played with your hands. For these type of fills, I play the first 2 notes as double strokes on the bass drum. The third grace note is played with the right hand, on one of the toms. The left hand plays the main note, on the snare drum. You can also move the right hand around the drum-set on each tom.
My usual application of this fill is to play 8th notes on the snare drum. The three grace notes are played immediately before each 8th note. This works well for fills in an 8th note rock context. You can also use these fills in jazz or any other style on the drum-set. Watch the video for a complete demonstration.
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