Short fill-ins
With
Alex ReevesAlex Reeves shows how to play short drum fills that lock to the same time and feel as your groove, subtly shaping a performance without overplaying.
What's in the course
15 lessons (1h 26m) · 1 free
01. Locking on
Free lesson4:27
02. Moving around the kit: Some basic ideas
4:37
03. Short fill-ins
You are here5:43
04. Longer fill-ins
4:55
05. Playing with music
4:51
06. Tightening up the Rhythm
7:00
07. Faster beats
5:31
08. Triplet phrases: snare drum only
7:01
09. Adding triplet phrases to fills
6:11
10. Combining triplets and straight sixteenths
5:28
11. The Shuffle feel
5:48
12. Dynamics
6:37
13. The use of long notes and space
4:54
14. Drum rolls
5:22
15. The remainder
8:24
Lesson transcript
Lesson Three: Drum Kit Fill-Ins
Hello, and welcome to lesson three! In this lesson, we're going to start doing some short fill-ins around the drum kit.
Practice Instructions
- Play this to a click at 70 beats per minute.
- Before each practice session, you should play the locking on study.
- If you're already comfortable with the simple beat, then try playing something a little bit more advanced.
Exercise Overview
- Here, I will play many bars of an eighth note groove before moving on to the fill phrases.
- Before you play each fill, play one bar of a simple beat.
Performance Tips
- Here, I will play the exercises as written.
- Then, I will play it with our interpretations.
- Make sure that you play the exercise correctly before you move on to the next one.
Inspiration
The grooves that drummers like Benny Benjamin played were deep in the pocket and had fills to match.
Example
- Here, I will play a Motown groove with a version of one of his money fills.
Enjoy your practice!
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Meet your guru
Meet your guru
Alex is a freelance musician who has performed live and in the studio with artists as diverse as Dizzee Rascal, Unkle, Bat for Lashes, Guy Garvey and Elbow. He has played headline slots at all the major UK festivals, including televised appearances on Glastonbury's Pyramid Stage, Oxygen Main Stage and T In The Park. International TV performances also include Live on MTV, the Jools Holland Hootenanny and The BBC Electric Proms with Dizzee Rascal.
On stage Alex has played with artists who have scored number one singles and albums all over the world, including Boy George, The Jones Girls and Johnny Hates Jazz. Alex has also been Musical Director for Island Records' Cocknbullkid, produced an album for Lotte Mullan, and performed live with Mercury nominated rapper Ty, American Blues legend Earl Thomas and singer-songwriter Ezio.
Alex has recorded in all the major studios in London, including Abbey Road, Angel, Air and Rak, and runs his own private drum studio from East London's Fortress complex. Recorded highlights at The Drum Fortress include the top 5 single Shine with the Lovefreekz, Wretch 32's Breathe, UNKLE's collaboration with Nick Cave and the beat for American rapper Nas's single Nasty. He has also played drums and percussion on major TV adverts for companies that include McDonalds, X-Box and Toyota, provided beats for computer games like Sega Rally 2 and Shellshock 2, and appeared on many TV and film soundtracks, including the major release of Brideshead Revisited.
Alex writes a regular tuition column for Drummer magazine, has written a book with accompanying DVD, and recorded a 1960s funk breaks sample CD. In his MusicGurus course, Fills In Time, he distils all that studio and stage experience into 15 quick lessons that sharpen your time-feel and build a vocabulary of drum fills you can drop straight into your own playing. And yes - he still calls his mum every week.
