The
following is an excerpt from Bill Bachman's book, "Quad
Logic".
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Scrapes are one of the best reasons to play quads. Also commonly referred
to as "sweeps," scrapes are defined as diddles that are played on two different drums,
the first beat of the diddle on any one drum, and the second beat
on a different drum. Scrapes are commonly used for three reasons:
musicality, logistics, and glamour. Musically, scrapes can offer new
effects through new drum-to-drum combinations; logistically, they
can help move hands "out of the way," to make certain drum-to-drum
combinations flow better. As far as glamour is concerned, scrapes
just plain look cool!
The
hand motions used when scraping diddles are no different than they
are when playing diddles on one drum. All diddles should be played
as two consecutive controlled legato strokes on a hand, using a combination
of wrist, fingers, and at fast tempos, forearms.
There
are really only two types of scrapes: those scraping outward, away
from the center of the body, and those scraping inward, towards the
center of the body. There are no special considerations needed for
playing outward scrapes. When playing INWARD scrapes, however, it's
helpful to turn your hands up a little so that the mallet downstrokes
toward the first drum at an angle. The faster the tempo/lower the
mallet height, the shallower the angle of the initial downstroke.
Although the hands themselves are turned up a little, the hand motion
doesn't change. DO NOT play inward scrapes with a "French Grip;" the fulcrum must still be located where the player can control the
mallet's side-to-side motion and his/her fingers can control both
beats of each diddle (check out the following picture):
| NOTE:
The slight turning up of the hands should happen naturally as
one tries to play inward scrapes with the hands flat. |
When
playing scrapes, it is imperative not to just "go with the flow"
of the forearm's motions; one must know exactly where each beat of
each scrape is contacting the drums. For ease of movement and conservation
of motion, be sure to play in the "scrape playing areas" (as shown in chapter 5 on set positions/playing areas). It is also
sometimes helpful to think about the three gaps between the drums
rather than the four drums themselves. Proper scrape technique can
be summed up as this: the hands turn from the wrist and incorporate
the use of fingers in order to play excellent quality diddles, while
the forearms move the hands where they need to go around the drums.
This is the key to playing scrapes with great sound quality.
Now
that the technique has been broken down, it's time to get behind the
drums and play some quality scrapes. Remember to periodically review
the "12 GOLDEN QUAD RULES" on page 22.
| NOTE:
The forthcoming notes notated with x's are cross-overs. To better
understand these, refer to Chapter 7 on cross-overs. |
If
you'd like to print out a clean copy of the "Scrapes" chapter
from Bill Bachman's book Quad Logic, download this
Acrobat PDF file. You'll need the free Acrobat Reader plugin (available
here).
| But wait, there's more! Try your hand(s) at Beatlicious, difficult solo from Bill's book! We've got some video to help you learn the solo, plus a PDF file that you can print on the next page! |
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