Rudiment Control: Clinic Edition

This is a book about the space between notes. The original packet was simply “Juxtapositions” consisting of exercises that compare rudiments that are comprised of the same sequence of strokes (e.g., l R r r L l l R sticking applies both to flam-taps and triplestroke rolls). Later, metric modulation patterns were added and the title was changed to Rudiment Control.

While previous editions have been better-suited to individual practice and private lessons, this new “Clinic Edition” aims to deliver a tool that every instructor can use to strengthen students’ rhythmic understanding, stick control, muscular awareness, and mental and physical chops.

This collection is every bit as thorough, cohesive, and organized as the 2015 edition, but it has been ambitiously retooled so that each page may be printed as a self-contained “handout” for private lessons, sectionals, or a rehearsal block. The staves are also larger to assist readability, and the exercises themselves are in a more digestible format.

Rudiment Control is not a high-level curiosity reserved for your most ambitious private students; it is a powerful approach for all drummers to better understand their minds and their hands and ultimately come to better teach themselves. The best thing that you can teach your students—for your own sake and for theirs—is how they can teach themselves. Awareness reveals the path to improvement, and this is how you build awareness.

This is Rudiment Control.