Donny Gruendler here!

Hello Donny.
Thakns for your reply! I was thinking of something along those lines. Cos if i play solid i have no problems with time but its amazing how doing fills can send you out of time if you don't concentrate. But thanks nfor replying. It means alot.
// Vincent.
 
Hey Vincent,
In regards to playing fills within your time -feel -- that can be quite difficult (even for the most experienced players). With this in mind, I share this exercise with all my students at PIT:

At a comfortable tempo on your click track--- Play one bar of time followed by a one bar fill. Thus, you are playing a two bar phrase. (If you use an 4 or 8 bar phrase and you are a "little off" on your transition -- you still have many bars to get back on the click.)

However, my suggested method does not allow you time to adjust to the click. (as your fill transitions into only one bar of time). Therefore, this will help you to work on (and tighten up) your transitions in a much more focused and effective manner.

I hope this helps.
Donny
 
Hello Bernhard and all you fellow drummers on DW,
It is a beautiful day here in Los Angeles and I thought that I would write everyone to say "Hello". Also - I apologize for not posting more regularly; but my family and I were in the middle of a huge addition and remodel of our house. Now that it has concluded and life is settling back in -- I wanted to share some exciting news with each of you.

"The Drum Room"
You see, part of the construction included a newly built (and fully sound-proofed) drum recording studio. It is especially wonderful that I have not bothered my neighbors w/ my drums since! There are two rooms - a small control room and a medium tracking space of 16x19 w/ 12 foot ceilings that angle downward to 9ft at a 45 degree angle.

One kit stays mic'ed up at all times and can be recorded in either Pro Tools or Nuendo. Furthermore, and rather than having a window between rooms (which can compromise the sound-proofing itself) - I used networked cameras which display both rooms activities simultaneously. So for all you drum studio/gear fanatics - I have posted some picts at Flikr: http://flickr.com/photos/26052066@N08/sets/72157604711963978/detail/

Thanks for taking a look and I hope to talk with each of you soon.
Donny
 
hello, I was interesting in the PIT program and i was wondering if its a good way to get into the "scene" I guess you could say, and get decent jobs, just for playing drums.
 
hello, I was interesting in the PIT program and i was wondering if its a good way to get into the "scene" I guess you could say, and get decent jobs, just for playing drums.
 
Hello Digga-Digga-Burr,
Thanks for taking the time to check in, say hello and write. I also apologize in my tardy response – I have been traveling quite a bit.

As for PIT, I do think that it is a wonderful place to learn, live and breath drums. You will get to study with some very talented faculty, play drums many hours a day, learn many different styles, improve your sound and time and ultimately -- get better at an accelerated rate. Due to the schools Hollywood, CA location, students also get access to auditions and meeting working musicians that “could” help them get work.


However (and with that being said), it is not just a place to get jobs and integrate into the music scene. This can only be accomplished if the student is working hard and can meet the requirements of a particular bandleader, artist or any other working professional. So if you want to attend – prepare to work hard.

Although, if you feel like you are already playing at a professional level – then my advice is to “give it a go” and just move to Los Angeles/Hollywood or NYC and begin to integrate yourself into the scene.

I hope that helps,
DG
 
Good morning Bernhard,
Greetings from sunny California - and thanks for taking the time to say hello. I certainly hope that you are doing well and enjoying life!

In addition (and for all fellow DW readers/members), I just updated my website. It has new audio clips from various records, and updated picts of the studio as well. Please feel free to take a look around, check in and write....

the site is:
www.donnygruendler.com

The audio page:
http://www.donnygruendler.com/media/audio

Studio Picts:
http://www.donnygruendler.com/gallery/the-studio

Have a great day,
Donny G
 
no, thank you being so helpful and kind.

i have a question, tough.

recently, i have been practicing table of time from joe morello's master studies and i have difficulties counting groupings of 5, 7, 9, 10, 11 and 12. can you please help me with this?

thank you in advance for your answer.

greetings from croatia
marin
 
Hi Donny, I just wanted to thank you for your exercises on time sound and form. They helped me to clean up some grooves that sounded like shit:) (I practice this every day) I spent years trying to find better foot technique (working on this motion, watching, observing, practicing heal-toe back and forth for hours) Now I realize it wasn't a technical (motion) problem, it was problem with shity spacing (subdivisions) in my head and bad timing. After few hours of this exercise the problem disappeared

Thanx man:)

I bought your book immediatley (playing with loops)

P.S.
I am also from croatia, you are very popular in Balkan as you can see;)
 
Hey Toza,
You are quite welcome! I am really glad that my exercises helped your playing. Many more of those exercises from the Firth site have been re-recorded and released in full-form (and in greater detail) @ Hudson Music. The series is called Private Lessons and it is a Digi-download.

In addition -- and once you have worked through all the Time, sound and Form stuff - I suggest that you make some practice playlists on your iPod. Make each playlist by "groove family" -- and from slow to fast - for example:

Playlist 1: One-Handed 16th Grooves:
Song 1 - 65 bpm
Song 2 =- 82 bpm
etc..

Other groove families include:
One-Handed 16th
Two-Handed 16th
Syncopated Hi-Hat (1-+ah etc..)
Four-on-the-floor
BD on 1&3
8th note grooves/8th BD
8th note grooves/16th BD
Blues Shuffles
Rock Shuffles
Halftime Shuffles
6/8 and 12/8 grooves
Ballads
2-beat Rock
Medium Rock
Uptempo Rock
Jazz/Swing
Reggae One-Drops
** there are many more - make your own...

This will take some time to compile; but once you do -- you will have the ultimate organized groove practicing tool. This will help you to stay organized, focused and accomplish clear groove goals from your practice routine. Especially as you may get burnt out on practicing exercises w/ the click.

So together: the click and the iPod can really work - if utilized correctly.

Greetings from Los Angeles,
Donny
 
Donny,
I dont know if you remember me man, its been a loooooong time, but my names Britt and I took a lesson with you in LA like 3 or 4 years ago. Still use those exercises you gave me to work on time. All the 16th note permutations, the sloooooow metronome, put it into my jazz practice too. Just wanted to say thank you for that and hope everything is goin great.
Hope you are well!
Britt
 
Hi Donny I have question about Time, sound and Form exercise. When you play grooves that don't have snare on only 2 and 4
grooves like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLyUxP3Vv0g
so in this third part of exercise (after cymbals) i play this groove with every snare hit or only i hit on 2 and 4 and play kick part as it goes?
 
Hi Donny I have question about Time, sound and Form exercise. When you play grooves that don't have snare on only 2 and 4
grooves like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLyUxP3Vv0g
so in this third part of exercise (after cymbals) i play this groove with every snare hit or only i hit on 2 and 4 and play kick part as it goes?

Hey Toza,
I suppose that would be up to you. Originally, I developed the time, sound and form exercises for backbeat based grooves. However, there is nothing to say that you couldn't apply these same principles of the excercise (the snare/kick, snare/kick/cymbals, 1 handed 16ths and 8th grooves) alongside your non-standard (I.e. non- 2 & 4 based) grooves.

If you do decide to move forward - please send me some transcriptions. I would love to see how you elaborated on these concepts. Best of luck!
Donny
 
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