Required Materials:
David Garibaldi’s The Funky Beat, Manhattan Music Publications. Hudson Music
1 – Introduction Video
2 - Overview
To get into more advanced coordination, ghost note patterns and the linear style we’re going to use David Garibaldi’s The Funky Beat, Manhattan Music Publications.
David is of course one of the most renown funk players and this book has some very well-thought-out studies which are helpful in developing these styles.
Read over the Introduction.
David deals with layered coordination before discussing the linear style.
In the layered concept more than one piece of the kit is played at a time. We’ve been using mostly layered coordination so far. The first pages of David’s book have some great grooves and exercises that can serve as a good review and will also introduce several new possibilities.
We’ll start with page 8.
3 - The Funky Beat, p. 8, Examples 1-4.
Notice that the LH, SD pattern is the same in each of these examples. Only the RH pattern changes.
We haven’t studied some of these RH patterns in depth yet but this is a good time to get introduced to them:
quarter notes
8th notes
“ands”
one 8th, two 16ths
Facility in these HH patterns will get you a long way in funk drumming.
In this lesson we’ll deal with patterns #2 and #3. We’ll get to #1 and #4 in Lesson 12.
Make sure the ghost notes are super-soft.
Practice these four examples at quarter note = 84 BPM, hands only, no feet.
4 - The Funky Beat, p. 8 & 9, Combining the Hands and Feet.
Now we have some hand patterns: a HH pattern for the RH and a SD pattern for the LH. Once we get very familiar with a hand pattern we can begin to add various BD patterns as in these exercises. The hands will begin to play almost by themselves and it’s much easier to add another rhythm on the BD. And it’s also easier to change the BD rhythm and keep the same hand pattern.
As David mentions, these BD patterns usually outline the SD patterns. In other words, if there’s a space between the SD notes, the BD fills in this space.
A. Combining the hand patterns and the BD patterns
In this video I’ll take hand pattern #1 from p. 8 and add one of the BD patterns from p. 9. Then I’ll take hand pattern #2, and add one of the four BD patterns.
In the video l go through all the hand patterns on p. 8.
For this lesson, work on RH patterns #2, 8th notes and #3, HH on “ands,” and add them to each of the four BD patterns on p. 9.
Note: I purposely didn’t write out all these exercises with the various HH and BD patterns because I think it’s much more valuable to be able to add them mentally without any transcriptions in front of you. This is the whole concept. Get the hand pattern going and add different BD patterns or vary the BD pattern as you go. This is the kind of mental awareness and concentration we’re looking for.
Note: In this video l played all the hand patterns. Again, for this lesson concentrate on patterns #2 & #3.
B. 4-Bar Phrases
It’s important to stretch our concentration so that we can hear and phrase our music in longer sections. That’s why we’re going to play these exercises, most of which could also be used as grooves in themselves, in 4-bar phrases.
Here’s the basic hand pattern #1 on p. 8 and BD pattern #8 on p. 9 in a 4-bar phrase.
As you can see, the HH note on 4 of the second bar becomes an open HH note, which sustains over the value of that note, in this case a quarter note. The SD ghost notes are played underneath the HH opening.
Use this same principle for the rest of the examples. In other words, the last HH note of the pattern you’re using becomes an open HH note.
Workbook
HH patterns #2 & #3 on p. 8 with each of the BD patterns on p. 9 in 4-bar phrases.
Keep the same HH and SD pattern throughout each example. Figure out exactly what’s happening under all the HH openings. There may be nothing, there may be some ghost notes and there may be some BD notes.
And don’t forget to change the BD in the 4th bar to “3” and the “and of 3”.
There’s a lot of work here. Take your time.
1. Play straight 8th notes on the HH (hand pattern #2 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #5 on p. 9. Play the 4-bar phrase 2 times (8 bars) at 75 BPM.
2. Play straight 8th notes on the HH (hand pattern #2 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #6 on p. 9. Play the 4-bar phrase 2 times (8 bars) at 75 BPM.
3. Play straight 8th notes on the HH (hand pattern #2 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #7 on p. 9. Play the 4-bar phrase 2 times (8 bars) at 75 BPM.
4. Play straight 8th notes on the HH (hand pattern #2 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #8 on p. 9. Play the 4-bar phrase 2 times (8 bars) at 75 BPM.
5. Play the HH on the “ands” (hand pattern #3 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #5 on p. 9. Play this for 8 bars at 75 BPM.
6. Play the HH on the “ands” (hand pattern #3 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #6 on p. 9. Play this for 8 bars at 75 BPM.
7. Play the HH on the “ands” (hand pattern #3 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #7 on p. 9. Play this for 8 bars at 75 BPM.
8. Play the HH on the “ands” (hand pattern #3 on p. 8 of The Funky Beat) along with the BD pattern #8 on p. 9. Play this for 8 bars at 75 BPM.
9. Play to “When My Baby Comes Back” by Jack Semple. Play “ands” on the HH and follow the song with appropriate fills, etc.