Music Lesson: Hip Hop Drum Patterns in "The Dog"

In the hip hop piece "The Dog," there are a couple of things I just want to draw your attention to because it's quite an unusual drum part that's been written.

Bar One: Half Time Feel

• The first bar has one snare on beat three, which creates a half-time feel.
• Normally, snares are on beats two and four, but when there's only one snare, we call it a half-time feel.

Demonstration

• To demonstrate:

  1. Normal groove: Snares on 2 and 4.
  2. Half-time groove: Snares reduced to just beat three.

• I changed the bass drum as well, as moving only the snare wouldn't yield the same feel. The half-time approach has a whole different feel.

Bar Two: Groove Revolution

• By the second bar, it feels like the groove has turned on its head:

  • Snare on beat one.
  • Snare on beat three.
  • Bass drum on beat two.

• This keeps us on our toes; we can’t relax too much because of all these changes.

Bar Three: Hi-Hat Fill

• The third bar resembles the first bar, but there's a hi-hat fill in the fourth bar of the first line that we need to watch for:
  • I instinctively want to play on beat three, but there's a rest there, so I'm trying hard not to.

Execution

• Observe the rest and come in with a bass drum on beat four.

• Here’s how it sounds:
  1, 2, 3, 4.

• It feels a bit strange having a quarter note rest after two eighth note hi-hats and then a bass drum on beat four, but it's good practice to tackle challenges.

Line Two: Moving Away from Half-Time

• In the second line, we have:

  • A heavy bass drum playing on beats 1, 2, and 3.
  • Hi-hat with snare on beat four.

• This means we're losing the backbeat on beats two for these bars.

Snare Fill

• There’s a snare fill halfway through bar three leading into bar four.
• I’ll play the whole line for you so you can hear it.
• For the snare fill, I favor Right, Left, Right, Right, Left, Right.
• I’ll play both hi-hats with the right hand, as they lock in well with the bass drum.

Line Three: Return to Funk Elements

• You might think we’re leading into a bass drum with a hi-hat on beat one of the third line, but we are not.
• The bass drum is on beats two and four for the first two bars.

Funk Influence

• This kind of feel is often heard at the beginning of funk or disco tunes.

• To demonstrate without moving too far from this piece:

  • A drummer might play 16th notes on the hi-hat at the start of a solo funk tune, with the bass drum on beats 2 and 4.
  • Example: 1, 2, 3, 4.

• Many hip hop drumming techniques originated from funk and soul tunes, with drummers from those pieces often sampled in hip hop.

Continuation and Conclusion

• When we reach the third bar of the third line, we reintroduce the snare on beat four.
• Bar four of the third line remains the same.

Final Line

• In the last line of this piece, there’s a more conventional drum groove, involving eighth notes on the hi-hat.
• The snare returns to its normal place on beats two and four, with bass drums alternating between quarter notes and eighth notes.

Last Bar

• The last bar starts with a half note rest, occupying the first half of the bar, so count through to hit beats three, the end of three, and four in the right place.

• Here’s how the last bar sounds:
  1, 2, 3, 4, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4.

• There are three snares in a row. You can play them differently; I choose to go to the hi-hat.

Sticking Pattern

• I will play the snares Right, Left, Left, leaving my right hand free to play the hi-hat on the last note.