Jazz & Drumming: Brushes

Τετάρτη 7 Φεβρουαρίου 2018

An Introduction to Brushes

I love brushes.

Brushes are more than a tool with which one plays the drums; they are an instrument in their own right. Brushes are used in different music styles, but their most extended applications are found in jazz.

Most people outside the world of jazz identify brushes with ballads and mellow or folksy tunes, but those who are more familiar with them know the wide range of moods that brushes can facilitate. Brushes can produce many kinds of sound, from soft to loud, from delicate to harsh, and everything in between. It’s an extremely responsive instrument, rich of nuances.

Although brushes were allegedly first patented in 1913, brush technique was never standardized. To this day there are no official brush rudiments or notation. Over the years I studied with different instructors and none of them shared the same technique or methods.

Certain drummer’s styles involve elaborate patterns that are often written down on paper like drawings, with lines and arrows, dots, dashes, curves and whatnot. Others stay as close as possible to sticks technique to minimize technical adjustments.

Brush technique involves sweeping motions, circular motions, vertical strokes, oblique strokes… like I said, it’s an instrument!

Διαβάστε περισσότερα »

Jazz Brushes Technique: Lateral Strokes (part one)

Posted on by Paolo

Becoming Familiar with Lateral Short and Long Strokes with Jazz Brushes

Back in September I wrote a post titled An Introduction to Brushes, where I examined how to produce long legato sounds using circular motions, an essential part of jazz brushes technique.

In this post I will describe another important area of brush playing: staccato sounds. The techniques that we are going to explore provide many interesting sound options, brushes have endless possibilities, and because different contexts call for different approaches, having an array of options is a good thing!

The first teacher with whom I had the opportunity to thoroughly study jazz brushes was Jon Hazilla back at Berklee. Jon is a true master, he has super solid technique and a very remarkable concept. One of the most valuable things that he shared with me was to think musically, and to translate rudimental drum technique to brushes in a way that dignifies brush playing rather than imitating stick technique. The content of this post is largely influenced by what I learned from Jon.

Διαβάστε περισσότερα »