Are you a Groove Player or a Technical Player?

MaryO

Platinum Member
So as I progress further along this drumming journey, I'm beginning to sense there are two basic approaches to drumming. Some people are striving for a groove kind of feel to their playing and some are trying to be as technical as possible. So I'm just curious, what's your approach or goal when playing?

I definitely want to become a drummer that someone listens to and say...Man, that girl can groove! I don't care about hitting 225 bpm or doing some Neil Peart 10 minute monster solo. Not a darn thing wrong with that but it's just not where I'm at.

So...Groove or technical?
 
Ideally, both, of course, but my natural inclination is very much towards the technical. (How many other people do you know who've been told by their teacher that they shouldn't spend QUITE so much time on rudiments?) Only when I'm able to play something as correctly as I can possibly get it, am I able to set the technique on autopilot while I then relax a bit into the groove and focus more on interpretation. If I know the hands and feet will take care of themselves, I find it a lot easier to be creative.

I'm still far, far too uptight but there was a time, not all that long ago, when I couldn't play anything at all unless it was written down!
 
I like the groove-nique approach. Groove first, second and third. My style is basically the bare minimal amount of "fills" as most drummers think of fills. Instead I like to make the beat itself chock full of nuance, complexity, with the judicious use of dynamics, while still being easily identifiable, which is where the technicality comes in. The technical stuff exists only to serve the groove, you know, to make the groove sound interesting and exciting. Technique is a great thing when married to, and subserviant to the groove.

I just want to see people dance and shake their bodies, that's the reason I drum. I live for the groove, and being in the zone.
 
I'm a long-time technical player who, late in life, has come to embrace the groove and all it embodies. Not that I don't work on technique, but like Larry, I have been using technique to try to make the groove memorable.

I think I am also concentrating on that third, lesser-talked-about quality of playing: tone. I like having an amazing-sounding instrument and being able to wrestle the best sound out of it that I can. Groove and technique are so much more satisfying with a well-tuned kit hit with just the right stroke.
 
I think I am also concentrating on that third, lesser-talked-about quality of playing: tone. I like having an amazing-sounding instrument and being able to wrestle the best sound out of it that I can. Groove and technique are so much more satisfying with a well-tuned kit hit with just the right stroke.

Hallelujah brother. Pulling an interesting tone from the kit, one that blends well dynamically with itself....and with the rest of the band...sounds great and it's a real challenge. One of the things that separate a good sounding drummer from a great sounding drummer.
 
So as I progress further along this drumming journey, I'm beginning to sense there are two basic approaches to drumming. Some people are striving for a groove kind of feel to their playing and some are trying to be as technical as possible. So I'm just curious, what's your approach or goal when playing?

I definitely want to become a drummer that someone listens to and say...Man, that girl can groove! I don't care about hitting 225 bpm or doing some Neil Peart 10 minute monster solo. Not a darn thing wrong with that but it's just not where I'm at.

So...Groove or technical?

I think I'm split right down the middle - but the phone rings more when I remain steadfast and groovy.
 
I started playing again after many years of not playing. When I was a kid (up through HS), I just 'screwed around' with the drums. When I started playing this time around, I decided to 'play right'. So I spend a lot of time watching instructionals, and working on different technical aspects of drumming (the progress I am making is debatable, and I'm quite modest and humble).

I'm not very good at just sitting down and getting into a groove. It's something I need to work on and get better at. I think you need to be creative to do this. Some folks, they seem to just "hear'' the beats - I think the beats just pop into their head. That doesn't happen to me too often unfortunately.

What I have to do, is hear a cool groove or beat, and then I try to copy/replicate it. Eventually, that - along with my busy schedule and kids that prevent me from jamming with others - led to me to just having fun doing drum covers.

When you do drum covers - only - you get very technical. I read sheet music and drum to it, which makes me very stiff and mechanical because I'm concentrating so hard. And people when they see my covers, always criticize me for being too stiff and mechanical - although they usually praise me for the sheet reading and the accuracy.

I think I would struggle if I were in a band because of this. I just can't improv and meld into a groove because of all this. And, I am now trying to make myself a little looser and less 'technical', or 'mechanical/robotic'.
 
I don't consider myself a technical player. I have what I'd define as good technique though. Or - at least as much technique as I desire to have to perform within the musical settings I desire.

My goal is to be as musical as possible given the context I'm in at that moment. In certain cases, the music can be demanding on technique while other times, not so much.

Regardless the music comes first and foremost and determines the "whats and hows" of what I'm going to play.
 
This basically sums it up, thread over lol.

No... thread not over... Uncle Larry...

Do you remember your own words in one of my thread?

You said: "There's a way to play simply that makes it sound great. It requires nuance and experience. I think a lot of guys play lots of notes because if there is a place where it would fit, why not? I can think of many reasons why not. You can play a simple beat, in a complex way, with dynamics, inner kit individual volume relation knowledge/control, barely audible ghosts, and much more, but most of all it has to have feel. A sense of just the right touch to put on a song is something that can be learned. I'm proof, I wasn't born with it.
A distilled drum part that feels right beats a more verbiose drum part that doesn't put feeling as Job 1 wins every time for me
."

So in other words, the red highlights of your quote imply a sound knowledge of the instrument, not just feel and playing a simple pattern, to get a groove going like you've explain in your quote requires a sound technical knowledge or skill, to pull out ghost notes efficiently alongside dynamics with a killer groove that has feel and emotion is one of the hardest thing to do, much harder than throwing fills left right and center.

Furthermore, a "groove" can be intricate and complex to play, sometimes more difficult than what's called "technical drumming".

So ideally you'll need both, groove AND technique, it's not a "either or" type of question IMO, one can hardly exist without the other, is what you chose to do with the skills you have that count.

9 times out of 10, I find that the music tells me what should I play (originals, not covers), I think I groove, but I'm also busy enough on the kit, much depends on the style too, some music definitely needs a simple pattern, some others a little more spice and sometimes overplaying just fit the bill, it's all drumming to me, you play what you feel fits the music.

I think I also know what Mary is asking in a more simple way, am I more a Steve Jordan or a Thomas Lang type of player, my guess is I'm more a Steve type of drummer if that makes sense.
 
OK thread not over Henri lol. No disagreement to what you said either. Well maybe a little, I think being technical is harder than grooving. Grooving is going with the flow, playing real technical requires a different approach and the brain of a mathematician. I guess it's all how a person is wired. Groove can be technical, just in a "not in your face" way. It's when the technical overshadows the groove that my phone would ring less too. I think by and large, drummers are rated, by the other musicians, as to how deep and how well they can groove first. Because if you've got that going on, meaning if you are grooving, then you are covering about 10 important bases already like blending in, right tempo, good meter, appropriate playing choices etc.

How others see us is more important than how we see ourselves...as far as being hired by others goes.

Hey it also depends on the gig. I couldn't do a Dream Theater type gig if my life depended on it.
 
Rather than groove vs technical, I view it as the ability to play "time" vs "solos". You can play solos like Neil Pert but, if you can't keep a beat you won't play with anyone.
 
Thanks for the replies everyone! A nice discussion forming here. I guess Henri is right (but then, isn't he always?) in that it's probably more about how you are perceived than how you actually play. I realize that groove and technical are not mutually exclusive and that in order to have one you must have the other. But, personally, I'd rather listen to someone who rocks a really cool groove, fast or slow, than someone who just plays a lot of technically difficult beats. In the end it's all about the music as a whole for me and how the drumming adds to it. As someone mentioned earlier...I want to see people get up and dance and clap their hands along to a good beat, not sit and be awed at how fast my sticks are flying.

Of course, it's all a matter of opinion and there is no right or wrong and that doesn't mean I don't have an awesome respect for those 225/bpm drummers.
 
Well maybe a little, I think being technical is harder than grooving. Grooving is going with the flow, playing real technical requires a different approach and the brain of a mathematician.

For many of us I guess you're right, but the top players can have the best chemistry and mix both technical skills with amazing grooving pattern. They're beyond the technical approach, they master the instrument so well they can express whatever they want to say, once you reach that kind of level everything's possible, that's the brain of a fully accomplished musician, not a mathematician, but I agree, not many of us get where they are...

One good example is Vinnie's work with Sting, a lot of the drums part are groove based and surprisingly simple to play, but he's also blending technicality and groove to astonishing effect with the famous "Seven Days" drum pattern http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EV0rJ6rvWbw and other few Sting's numbers.

Hey it also depends on the gig. I couldn't do a Dream Theater type gig if my life depended on it.

Me either, ... but never been a big fan of DT or Mike Portnoy though.

I guess Henri is right (but then, isn't he always?)

I wish I was... lol, but unfortunately no...

...in that it's probably more about how you are perceived than how you actually play.

Absolutely, that's why guys like Vinnie Colaiuta, Steve Gadd, Simon Phillips, just to name a few, gets so many calls, they can do it all, all styles, technical, grooving, soloing, leading, supporting, complementing and always spot on for taste, feel and musicality.
 
The approach I take is to play the song, not the instrument. I do like to be technically challenged, so I like to have a few tunes on the set list that push my chops. But others require a more basic style to work for the song, so that's what I play.
 
I gotta have both. I'm not Zen enough to be Charlie Watts (can't imagine never playing any fills), but I don't really like the kind of music that would require the technical onslaught of say, a Portnoy type player.

Right up the middle is where I'm happiest.
 
I am a groove drummer, and that has to be because that's what I've always been called to provide, the groove.

I guess I can pull off a few technically-dazzling riffs here and there, things I picked up from other drummers over the years and are a gas to play, but that's not really what my playing style is about.

Put me down as a groove drummer, and happy to be classified as such.
 
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