Lets face it, drums are probably the most fun instrument to play for beginners and pros alike, purely because even if you are completely useless behind the kit it's still a whole heap of fun to just bash away, well maybe not for your neighbors... but lets not worry about them right now.

I started drumming about 16 years ago and was completely self-taught playing everything by ear and had never even heard of drumming rudiments. That was until years later after going through different garage bands and becoming more familiar with time signatures and grooves, I started to become frustrated with my coordination between my left and right hands, I had spent too many years playing 4/4 timing on my hands and just using by double bass technique as a crutch to get me through.

I got away with it for a long time until I joined a band that over the years became more progressive and had very good musicians in it. As time went on our style got more and more intricate and technical mainly due to the fact out guitarist was classically trained and liked to mess about with timing a lot. At first I was very afraid that I would not be able to keep up with this shift the band was taking and quite honestly I felt like a bit of a fraud, that was until a drummer friend of mine told me about rudiments so I looked them up.

Basically back in the 1930s The National Association of Rudimental Drummers was founded and they selected a set of thirteen drum rudiments to standardize the way drummers would be judged. These Thirteen Drum Rudiments were selected from the 26 Standard American Drum Rudiments.

Once I discovered these rudiments it opened my eyes - bigtime!! I started practicing them right away on desks much to the delight of my school teachers, kitchen tables much to the delight of my mother and pretty much anything that could be tapped on. One thing I will say and this goes for a few people I have discussed rudimental drumming with have said the same thing.. that is the fact that it can feel quite boring and repetitive.

But if you do stick to it you will find your rhythm and timing will improve greatly, and also something else I noticed is that I have started to involuntary play rudiments with my feet now with ease as the groove of them is implanted in my head so I can now play better double bass technique as a result. Give it a go you will find drumming a lot more fun when you can play rudiments with ease and stick in accents and paradiddles and flams, into your songs.

Best of luck with it folks, now get out there and annoy everyone around you by practicing your drum rudiments on every surface you can find!!

Links to Rudiments
Rudiments 1 - 13 Click to View
Rudiments 14 - 26 Click to View