Traditional grip for rock?

C

cantstoplt021

Senior Member
Anyone use traditional grip in a rock setting? I originally started playing with matched, but it was causing pain in my wrist so I switched over to trad. I also play guitar so traditional from day one has felt more comfortable for me because it's kind of like you hold the neck in guitar. Now can you use traditional in a rock type setting? My interests are more in the funk/blues/jazz area, but I'd like to be able to play some rock too. Can you do this well with traditional? I would use matched but it tends to start hurting my wrist.

I have also heard (not sure if it's true) that if you can play traditional you can play matched. Not sure how true this is as I seem to have pinky control issues when using matched with my left hand. I'm sure this could be fixed easily with practice, but it starts to hurt my wrist pretty quickly for whatever reason. I do stay relaxed so not sure why it is. Anyway anyone play rock with traditional?
 
Check this guy out...

I have played some pretty loud music with my trad-grippin' ways. Just about any limitation you may attribute to the grip is really a limitation in your playing that can be remedied with practice and private instruction.

I'm definitely more comfortable playing in trad but as my skill has improved I feel my LH matched grip improving as well, and I don't ever work on that.

Here is another fun one. A little shaky but that Nick has some killer chops.
 
You just have to work at it and use things like velocity and inertia to your advantage. To be honest, most of the time I think trad is best for lighter-touch kind of stuff, but I've seen a lot of guys get up and just kill a rock show playing trad the whole time. I always had trouble with things like rim-shots in trad.
 
Red Menace said:
Check this guy out...

I have played some pretty loud music with my trad-grippin' ways. Just about any limitation you may attribute to the grip is really a limitation in your playing that can be remedied with practice and private instruction.

I'm definitely more comfortable playing in trad but as my skill has improved I feel my LH matched grip improving as well, and I don't ever work on that.

Here is another fun one. A little shaky but that Nick has some killer chops.
Click to expand...


Oh wow both very impressive... now is that bad for your wrist? I've heard that criticism before that playing hard with traditional grip is bad for the wrist. Not sure how much truth there is in that
 
I play traditional grip and am in a punk/post-punk band - I switched to trad grip for my jazz playing (after years of playing matched) and am now just more comfortable using traditional grip. I think because I had developed bad habits as a self taught drummer playing matched that I would tense up when playing - whereas traditional grip was a blank slate with no poor habits attached to it (and I was by this time taking jazz drumming lessons which helped improve my technique tenfold) so I'm very relaxed when I play using it, but as they say, your mileage may vary!
 
cantstoplt021 said:
I have also heard (not sure if it's true) that if you can play traditional you can play matched.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't say so. I started out playing matched for 2-3 years before switching 100% to traditional grip. I was playing everything(rock, jazz, metal, etc.) in traditional at that time before taking serious percussion studies.

Then only I realized that my left hand is lacking control and dynamics when playing matched, not to mention they're giving weak doubles too. However, my left hand seem to be able to put out more force playing matched; I can play louder and faster(eventhough my matched single strokes are imprecise and poorly controlled). Maybe because I'm left handed?

Recently back on the kit I also realized that my left traditional grip is actually not doing me much good now, especially with rim shots. I just find my left hand absorbing all the impact of the shot, and, although I'm more controlled with traditional, it can't seem to put out the power some styles of music (ie. rock and metal) demand for. So once again, I found myself to be back in the matched grip world.

Personal opinion: From a percussion's perspective, I think matched grip would provide drummers many more advantages over traditional grip. Traditional grip is strictly confined to snare drum and kit playing in the Western world. There may be a few other drums that you play in a traditional grip-like method (don't know the names; there's a Punjab one and a Japanese one, and maybe a few others), but when you look at many other percussion instruments in the world: ie. xylophone, timpani, timbales, taiko, and the many hand drums in this world, don't they all use matched grip (or should I say hands)?

Sure, they all have their own special techniques compared to matched snare drum playing, but the hand movements are there. What I'm trying to say is, there are probably more percussive instruments out there that's in demand that requires both hands going up-down, as compared to one hand up-down, the other hand going clockwise-counterclockwise. I may be wrong, but meh, my two cent philosophy.

I thought I saw a thread earlier about how trad players like Steve Gadd and Dave Weckl are switching to matched due to pain in the left arm?
 
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FFFF said:
I thought I saw a thread earlier about how trad players like Steve Gadd and Dave Weckl are switching to matched due to pain in the left arm?
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I've heard it bandied around drum forums for several years now too. I'm just waiting for evidence of Weckl actually doing it consistently though. Gadd has pretty much always switched between the two, so his supposed change is less noticeable. But the vast majority of Weckl clips I've managed to find since he made those statements show him still using trad. If he's abandoned it as he claims, then it appears he's pretty bloody selective about when he chooses to display it. Lord knows evidence of a total change of tack is scarce. Who knows, when he actually starts living it, I might actually start believing it. Thomas Lang seems to be the only guy I can find who has stood by what he says. And even then, just because it's applicable to him doesn't mean it's applicable to me......or anyone else. Far too many examples of guys who played a lifetime with the stick through the fingers with no long term damage for me to jump on the bandwagon because one or two others claim issues with it.
 
Absolutely! I play trad in all styles. Never was an issue.
 
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One interesting thing that has evolved recently is using traditional grip to play brushes on a cajon. The grip developed out of necessity in the first place because of how marching snares were slung over the shoulder at an angle. But I've noticed people are starting to play the cajon with brushes and bundle rods and talking about how it helps using traditional grip (sometimes with both hands!) to get the sounds they need. It would be funny if this caused a resurgence of the grip.
 
cantstoplt021 said:
Anyone use traditional grip in a rock setting? I originally started playing with matched, but it was causing pain in my wrist so I switched over to trad. I also play guitar so traditional from day one has felt more comfortable for me because it's kind of like you hold the neck in guitar. Now can you use traditional in a rock type setting? My interests are more in the funk/blues/jazz area, but I'd like to be able to play some rock too. Can you do this well with traditional? I would use matched but it tends to start hurting my wrist.

I have also heard (not sure if it's true) that if you can play traditional you can play matched. Not sure how true this is as I seem to have pinky control issues when using matched with my left hand. I'm sure this could be fixed easily with practice, but it starts to hurt my wrist pretty quickly for whatever reason. I do stay relaxed so not sure why it is. Anyway anyone play rock with traditional?
Click to expand...

I use trad grip about 90% of the time. However, I don't play that much rock. Blues is as close as I get. I don't have any issues at all with it. Neither do several pros...

Check out Steve Ferrone, Matt Chamberlain, Ryan Hoyle, Steve Smith, Stan Lynch, or Charlie Watts just to name a few.
 
one thing that will help is to get as much stick height as you can by moving the two fingers on top of the grip out of the way when you need to play loudly (like on backbeats).

If you do that, the wrist doesn't have to go so far back and you won't end up putting too much torque on your wrist.

This way, you use gravity to your advantage, and rely more on the fulcrum to the control the stick. Keep your finger close though (I tend to wrap my fingers back around the stick in between backbeats) so they're in position to hepl control the stick when you don't need that 75-90 degree stick angle.


To answer the original question: guys like Stewart Copeland, Steve Jordan, Stan Lynch, Matt Chamberlain, etc have done plenty at high volumes with traditional grip.


And remember that Rick Allen from Def Leppard was a traditional grip player before his accident. Hard Rock Traditional Grip!
 
I play mostly rock and roll and I use traditional grip. I can hit plenty hard with my left hand.
I must say that after a four hour gig my left hand is very tired. And I experience some slight pain in my left thumb area.

I think for a long four hour gig it is more tiring to grip the stick between your thumb and the edge of your palm (left hand); than it is to grip the stick between your thumb and your index finger (right hand).



.
 
Cool! Nice to see others also using traditional for other styles than jazz. I play rock and metal with traditional grip.

It's pretty interesting that some people associate traditional grip with lightness of touch and not with power. It's like they've never even heard of fife and drum corps or DCI.
 
I play 99,9% trad, only play matched when moving from cross sticking or certain hi-hat things. I hit plently hard.

Both grips should work fine for anything. trad makes it easier to move up on the tip of the stick for variation, especially with jazz playing, matched has a bit more reach. Trad left hand generally takes a bit more practice, but I don't mind.

Use whatever you like. Any kind of pain is offcourse the result of inpropper technique. A lot of guys attribute that to traditional grip, but it's just bad habits, something I think a lot of even the famous guys, the early both technical and hard hitters struggle with because they played for a long time before they really looked into those issues.
 
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