Here's a cadence I've been working on for the past couple of days. I tried to write it with the HS line I teach in mind, keeping the tenor vocabulary pretty narrow while giving the snares and basses a little more to strive for.

As far as construction goes, I was trying to make something atypical for a modern street beat without being too schizophrenic. I'll let you all judge how well it was achieved; feedback is appreciated.

VDL recording, mp3 (1584 KB): http://www.fatmattdrums.com/mp3/july6_streetbeat.mp3

3-Page Score, PDF (156 KB): http://www.fatmattdrums.com/pdf/pusher_00_score5.pdf

It's named "Pusher", after one of my favourite X-Files villains.

Cheers.


PS

If anyone is interested in using this piece, in part or in whole, get in touch with me for parts, clarifications, and corrections.

Well, if you can get a high school drumline to play that, then kudos to you man. I like the piece, my only problem with it is that it is probably going to make a high school drumline poop themselves.

Nice writing though

its a good idea but tone it down for high schoolers, who have to teach themselves with a little assitance from band director

There are some easy waterings-down that wouldn't seriously affect the music: flam-fives can become five-stroke rolls; the quad skank figure with three RH taps and a RH rim shot (1e&A) can lose one of the taps (1e-A); the quad stick shots that are prepped with crushes on the "E" can have those crushes moved to the downbeats if feet become a problem.

The biggest challenge I see with this piece is justifying the time we will have to spend taking it under-tempo with the metronome, as ensemble cohesion will be the major issue. I'll have to see how well the book is coming along this summer, but based on what I've seen so far, this should be rudimentally within their reach for the season. I think it will push them, but not be infeasible.

The advantage of triplet-based grooves in a cadence is that you can include exposure to more-advanced vocabulary, 120 BPM being comfortably slow for flam rudiments. The 9let-based roll figures are going to be a mental challenge, but they are physically equivalent to triplet diddles around 160–176, and if my snare drummers can't achieve that, then I've got bigger problems than just this piece. The flam-fives are quick, but with the small 6"–3" height difference, they rely more on roll skills than the accent-tap demand that usually makes flam figures difficult. The highest demand on the bass line is for drums 1 and 2, where the most capable players are. As for cymbals... I may have to dig to find a pit member who's comfortable marching while playing "tings" on the third triplet partial.

Sir, that sounds so epic but sounds ridculous to get down.