STICK CONTROL (George L Stone) Your experiences and suggestions

Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

NUTHA JASON said:
good one.

GLS is also very good for breaking in a foot ostinato. once you can play the ostinato steadily for prolonged peroids you are ready to add hands on top. a lot of guys freeform stuff over the feet but for a bit of structure in your practice as well as a way of ensuring you can pretty much play anything over the feet, try working through page 5, 6 and 7 over the ostinato. its good because you are also familiar with the hand patterns alone, then adding them over the feet adds a new challenge - independance!

j
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Here's a great way to get the independence to solo over various latin rhythms, you can do it with any latin "bass line" like the baio and samba foot patterns.

You set a metronome pretty slow, and play a samba. Play with just your feet for a minute or two. Then play through the first page of stick control, devoting eight bars to each exercise before SEAMLESSLY(very important, make it sound like a single stream of notes) switching to the next pattern. Go through this and bring up the tempo on the metronome gradually. Another technique is essentially the same, but instead of playing eight bars of each pattern, you play four bars in normal time, then 8 bars of double time, then seamlessly switching.

I just tried this method out on the drumset and it's really damn hard. I suggest it strongly.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

NUTHA JASON said:
i have a giant kitchen clock in front of my drums.

j
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me too..lol



i notice this book needs alot of self motivation. Not that i lack of any, just an observation.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

CVdrummer said:
i notice this book needs alot of self motivation. Not that i lack of any, just an observation.
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I think you need to enjoy doing those exercises to a certain extent. It won't work otherwise, because you really need to do it regularly, and for a quite a long period of time in order to observe significant results. One is likely to give up pretty quickly if every session seems just like boring repetitions of the same pattern.

My personnal thrill is the accuracy challenge. I set my metronome in cut-time, I listen to the sound of each strokes, try to make them as even as possible, and I just try to catch the beat right on the money every 4 strokes (first three pages) . Amazing how each pattern becomes different than the others when approached that way.

As much as I have fun doing that, I still don't practice stick control on my set very often. I use a practice pad, because all the other goodies on the drum set are ... quite fun as well. Too distracting.

I guess you need to find ways to "entertain" the self-motivation with this book.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

shuffle said:
I think you need to enjoy doing those exercises to a certain extent. It won't work otherwise, because you really need to do it regularly, and for a quite a long period of time in order to observe significant results. One is likely to give up pretty quickly if every session seems just like boring repetitions of the same pattern.

My personnal thrill is the accuracy challenge. I set my metronome in cut-time, I listen to the sound of each strokes, try to make them as even as possible, and I just try to catch the beat right on the money every 4 strokes (first three pages) . Amazing how each pattern becomes different than the others when approached that way.

As much as I have fun doing that, I still don't practice stick control on my set very often. I use a practice pad, because all the other goodies on the drum set are ... quite fun as well. Too distracting.

I guess you need to find ways to "entertain" the self-motivation with this book.
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hm..i think my words came out wrong. i enjoy this book alot. I enjoy working out of it and i work on it and practice daily on it. but for some reason i tend to look at stuff in different points of view, so i put my self on a person shoe that's ..hmm i guess you can say lazy or just not discipline. so that's where that came from.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

jazzsnob said:
Here's a great way to get the independence to solo over various latin rhythms, you can do it with any latin "bass line" like the baio and samba foot patterns.

You set a metronome pretty slow, and play a samba. Play with just your feet for a minute or two. Then play through the first page of stick control, devoting eight bars to each exercise before SEAMLESSLY(very important, make it sound like a single stream of notes) switching to the next pattern. Go through this and bring up the tempo on the metronome gradually.
I just tried this method out on the drumset and it's really damn hard. I suggest it strongly.
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I have done this as well and it is really good for pushing technique to a higher level. And you're right - it is hard!! It takes alot of self-motivation to work this!

Mike

http://www.mikemccraw.com
http://www.dominoretroplate.com


http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=drummermikemccraw
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

so i have been working on the first three pages for two months now and have tried different practice tactics. i though i would share my most streamlined on with y'all.

its a progress chart that allows me to keep a record of what i have done each day. in the little boxes i tick off each 'session' which is described in the column headings above. so each block in the first column is worth 1 minute 30 seconds of the GLS exercise at 120 BPM where each bpm is a quarter note (ie two strokes per count). this mathematically works out to twenty playthroughs in the alloted time. by way of reward as i progress through the chart the speed goes up and the time goes down but it always comes out at 20 times per exercise.
generally speaking i do a solid run through 12 exercises without stopping (ie one half of one page) before taking a break from GLS and working on something else. i try to get through all 72 exercises every day. fitness and ability are improving and so i am finding this easier to achieve each week.
the control ability i am developing is already showing in all my playing. it has been well worth it.
when i have completed this chart i am going to step it up a notch and make a maintenance routine that will see me playing the first three pages @ 180bpm for 45s and then later on honed to 200 bpm for 30 seconds (so a session will take 36 minutes). this i feel will be easy to do daily.

 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

He Nutha, I've said it once in this thread, but I'll repeat it at the risk of sounding cheesy : I'm amazed by your schedule and discipline with this book...

One little comment : From a rhythmic perspective, I personnally prefer to set my metronome at 4 strokes per count. I'm at work and I don't have my book with me, but aren't some exercises becoming somehow too similar if you're set at two strokes per beat ?

I really don't devote as much time as you do with these... 30 minutes a 3-4 times a week. I navigate between 80 and 95 bpm, 4 strokes per beat for roughly 30 seconds per exercises. It is faster than you, which only makes me think I should probably slow way down... Food for thought.

The only other comment I would have is that the 20 bpm increment seems a bit steep.

But amazing schedule, again, congrats, and thanks for sharing.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

THANKS

One little comment : From a rhythmic perspective, I personnally prefer to set my metronome at 4 strokes per count. I'm at work and I don't have my book with me, but aren't some exercises becoming somehow too similar if you're set at two strokes per beat ?
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i haven't noticed this. the more metronome ref points at this slow speed the more accurate i can be. to combat any boredom or exercise similarity i ...

- occasionally play the exercise with one hand on the ride or middle tom and the other on the snare.

- always set aside extra time to mess arround with these exercises informally (no metronome, within a groove, made into fills, orchestrated on the kit, swing the feel etc)

I really don't devote as much time as you do with these... 30 minutes a 3-4 times a week. I navigate between 80 and 95 bpm, 4 strokes per beat for roughly 30 seconds per exercises. It is faster than you, which only makes me think I should probably slow way down... Food for thought.
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even at 200 or in your case 95 i find most of the exercises easy to do. but at those speeds some of the triple stroke stuff is not as even as i would like. so i slowed it right down to really study my technique.

The only other comment I would have is that the 20 bpm increment seems a bit steep.
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remember that in terms of your settings it would only be a jump of 10 bpm. also, as i've said, the tempos are not too challenging for me so the jump is quite refreshing once the exercise is nailed. i can play most of these pretty smoothly at 180 already.

j
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

NUTHA JASON said:
i haven't noticed this. the more metronome ref points at this slow speed the more accurate i can be. to combat any boredom or exercise similarity i ...
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Trying to remain accurate with less reference points is exactly what combats boredom for me. At the extreme I would like to be able to play these at 8 strokes per count, and I would probably be bored after a few minutes at 1 stroke per count. We usually play with a quarter note click in band rehearsals, and I found practicing GLS at 4 strokes per count helped me a lot keeping 16th note fills clean, and landing properly on the downbeat.

But I havn't worked at tempos as slow as yours. May be it would change my mind. I'll try

NUTHA JASON said:
even at 200 or in your case 95 i find most of the exercises easy to do. but at those speeds some of the triple stroke stuff is not as even as i would like. so i slowed it right down to really study my technique.
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I start struggling with many exercises around 100 (200 for you...), but some triples and quadruples could surely benefit from lower speed work as you do. I just don't have the discipline to slow down all a given page for these few, and I don't work on specific exercises either. What I like is going from one to another.

NUTHA JASON said:
remember that in terms of your settings it would only be a jump of 10 bpm. also, as i've said, the tempos are not too challenging for me so the jump is quite refreshing once the exercise is nailed. i can play most of these pretty smoothly at 180 already.
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Of course. I was mentionning this because I usually jump in increments of 5. But since your objective is to cover a much wider range of tempos, I guess your 20 bpm increment makes sense.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

I just don't have the discipline to slow down all a given page for these few, and I don't work on specific exercises either. What I like is going from one to another.
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yeah i'm always tempted to cheat on the first 8 and some of the other simple exercises (sinve i've been doing rolls and diddles for years). having the charts helps because after filling in a few columns and knowing how valuable each tick is i find it hard to cheat on the jason of the past who slogged it out nor cheat on the jason of the future who will want to be proud that he covered it all well.

i also do like going from one exercise to the other. perhaps there is a future chart for playing 12 exercises through once each and repeating this all 20 times. it does keep you on your toes and there is an element of problem solving like when you end with three lefts and then the next exercise wants you to start with three (six strokes in all - quite a beast at high speeds).

j
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

It's amazing that practicing Stick Control slowly has such a big effect on faster playing. I've been practicing SC at 100 bpm for a month or so using a variation of Jazzsnob's program, and I can already see, hear and feel a big improvement in my singles and double stroke rolls at higher tempos.

It makes sense, since all that changes is the rate of strokes; the strokes themselves are quick, sharp and powerful even at 100 bpm.
 
The missing page of GLS stick control

exercise 72 of page 7 is really weird. totally out of place and alone. almost a hint from Mr.stone that there was more he wanted to include. in the first three pages we see singles, doubles, triples, quadruples and near the end even two sextuples. so from this i deduced a further page with some 5s, 7s and more. i feel it is a faithful estimation of where GLS could have gone next.


jasonhorslerstickcontrol.jpg


j
 
Re: The missing page of GLS stick control

Jason, good one, I did the same thing with # 73. But, thats as far as I went with it. The rest of those you came up with are cool. Maybe, that's why Stone wanted Joe Morello to re-write the book. Joe did not want to do that, he thought it was perfect the way it is. Good work Jason.
 
Re: The missing page of GLS stick control

It is funny that you mention this, I was also thinking #72 was completely out of place. Actually, I think many exercises are strange starting at #63, which is (from memory) RRRL LLRR RLLL RRRL.

I don't think such asymetric stickings are present in the first 62 exercises

Many exercises among those last 10 feel more difficult to me - some definitely require more concentration. He may very well had many others in mind, but (unlike you !) he may have felt those first 72 were more than enough for single beat workout. As I mentionned previously, I somehow feel one should also reserve some practice time for page 8 and following.

Your "page 7.5" looks great. Thanks. I'll print it for sure, and insert it in the book, though I'm still not sure if I'm happy or not to now be aware they exist. I used to feel satisfied when completing the first 72, and now, here's another 24.... :)
.

Thanks again. Great post.
 
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Re: The missing page of GLS stick control

I would move #77 up to the #75 position. I love #74... I like the feeling of that one.
 
Re: Stick Control

what is the basis of the stone killer exercises... how does it start out for someone who has the book, i have heard nothing but good things bouat this book i just havent had time to check it out yet.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

"The Stone Killer" is out of Joe Morello's book...Master Studies.
 
Re: STICK CONTROL (george L stone) your experiences and suggestions

Hi I'm new here. Here are a few things I've done with stick control pages 5-7 on the kit:

1. Play jazz time with your ride hand and hi hat foot, while playing any Right's with your kick, and Left's on your snare. This can be done both with the stick control examples as SWUNG 8th's, or as TRIPLETS.

2. Same as above, but take the Left's and move them around the snare and toms, so that RLRL RLRL would be kick-snare-kick-tom1-kick-tom2-kick-floortom

3. Do the same as 1 and 2, except with Right being the hi hat foot rather than the kick.

4. Same as number 3, but with quarter notes tapping on the kick.

5. Play a samba foot pattern (dotted 8th + 16th kick, hi-hat foot on 8th note upbeats) while playing the stick control examples with one hand playing rimclicks on the snare and the other hand playing a cowbell or ride bell.

6. Play the stick control examples with your hands while playing straight 8ths between your feet (LRLR for every 4 stick control notes)

7. Play the stick control examples with your hands while playing straight 16ths between your feet (LRLRLRLR for every 4 stick control notes)

8. Play the stick control examples with your feet (L=hi hat foor or left bass drum pedal, R=right bass drum pedal) whike playing straight 8ths with your hands (LRLR)

9. Same as number 8, but playing a double stroke roll with your hands (16ths or 32nds, either way).
 
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