Help with 6/8 grooves

Finger Drumming Lessons / Courses / Practice
1

I’m working on a slow song in 6/8 - almost like a triplet waltz at 84bpm. Looking for some groove ideas for that time sig. ranging from simple to complex. Anybody have any good suggestions/resources for me?

2

As far as lessons go I have two simple ones.

For the rest I can only think of two fast 12/8 grooves in the Next level beats course. Those are nice to practice for some triplet feels, but it’s not a waltz at all and they’re not slow :slight_smile:

Log In ‹ The Quest for Groove — WordPress
Log In ‹ The Quest for Groove — WordPress

Some popular songs I like in thirds:

  • Queen - Somebody to love (and “we are the champions” as well ofcourse)
  • Beatles - Oh darling and Norwegian Wood (norwegian wood is fun because it has no drums so you can play an additinal drum part)
  • Billy Joel - Piano man and Always a woman (also no drums so fun to jam along to)

I also found this spotitfy playlist with songs in 3 an 6/8. Maybe if you skip through this youll hear some cool ideas? >> Songs in Waltz time 3/4 and 6/8 Time Signatures - playlist by icyhead | Spotify

Cheers!

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3

Although I hadn’t seen any 6/8 material yet, I am glad you have lessons that cover it.

Someone on Unfa’s discord shared this

I think that’s what I’m gonna use for the basis of the groove, and I’ll work towards section 6 to at least get one 6/8 fill under my belt. The Jeremy Ellis groove he shares will work well because it can be simplified and made complex as a way of adding dynamics to the song.

Thanks Rob, and drum on!

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4

Update on this, this groove is a LOT harder than I thought - requires a great deal of hand independence and practice. Still working on it.

I’ve worked through the engineering fills course, and the way I interpret the method that course teaches is

  1. Practice rudiments on one drum and nail dynamics
  2. Practice rudiments on one drum as a fill for a beat
  3. Take that rudiment and spread it across the kit

The question I have is since I’m writing this tune in 6/8, how would the rudiments work with that? Do I start them on the 3 so I’m hitting 3+4+5+6+ and then the crash+kick on the downbeat? Any suggestions on this one?

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5

Well, if you’re working in groups of 3 you have some freedom to decide how you’re going to approach the rudiments.

For example in groups of 3:
1 2 3 1 2 3
R L L R L L

or:

1 2 3 1 2 3
R L R R L R

Both are fine. But they’re not 4/4 rudiments, they’re different rudiments for a beat in 3’s or 6es.

So if you want to add in some cool, stuff in a 6/8 groove, the most importsnt part is that you land where you want to land (most of the time on the one with your dominant hand), but it does not matter if you did R R L (R) < one
or R L L (R) < one.

Or in 6, something like R L L R L L (R) < one
or R L R L R L (R) << one

All variations are fine. They end up in the correct spot and you can keep going with your groove. You have a lot of freedom to decide which hand does what and when you play a double stroke with one hand and when a single stroke.

Does this make things clearer? If not I can quickly record something tonight during the livestream.

Let me know!

6

I appreciate the breakdown of this - I hadn’t thought about doing partial rudiments for fills with 6. I just got the basics of the groove (minus that clave thing Ellis does with his R middle finger) up to tempo last night, and now am working on getting it ingrained in my fingers - once that feels effortless and I can nail the 1 with the Grid metronome, I’ll work on some fills and other embellishments in the groove.

As far as the livestream, I’ll leave that up to you as it’s your livestream and your time. I’ll be tuning in either way.

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