Free Online Djembe Drum Lessons

Rhythm of the Week...

Free Online Drum Rhythm Lessons

How to read the notation

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This Week's Lesson:

Drumming Music Notation - Hand Drum Lessons with Easy Rhythm Instruction for African Drumming Music, Latin Drumming and other Hand Drum Rhythms.

free music education resources and drumming tips for beginning or advanced drummers...or anyone just wanting to groove with world beat and alternative music - including Roots Jam: hand drum rhythms & lesson book

Lesson One

Rhythm notation
Example
Anchors and variations
Four-four and other useful constructions

Lesson Two: More variations

Lesson Three: Workshops

Lesson Four: Improvisations

Lesson Five: Advanced Notation

Lesson Six: Drum Circles: Beyond the Basics

A guest article by Shawn Garbett, with rhythm notation

Lesson Seven: 3/4 or 6/8?

Lesson Eight: Tonasket Road (original composition)

Lesson Nine: Short Bell, Long Bell, Universal Break (and Rumba Clave)

The rhythm notation . . .

The following notation can be easier for drummers and percussionists to use, compared to the usual notes and lines. Because notes aren't sustained but struck once, it makes sense to show the timing for these beats as single and equal. Rests are measured by the same, single-beat units.
The Glossary describes the notes, primarily those played on the west African djembe.

Glossary:
D: Dun ("Doon")=bass beat with left hand
G: Gun ("Goon")=bass beat with right hand

d: do ("doe")=rim beat with left hand
g: go=rim beat with right hand

T: Ta=slap beat with left hand: sharp glancing stroke
P: Pa=slap beat with right hand

- = space

Though the majority of the rhythms displayed here will show leading with the left hand, the handing can be reversed. In fact it makes sense to play both ways equally well, or to alternate for balance. I'm right-handed but still find it easiest to lead with the left--maybe because the first few rhythms I learned were left-leading and I just got used to it. (Or maybe because I had learned also to plant trees alternating right and left hands, to save my arms from tendonitis). If you're just starting out and want to follow my notation with a dominant right hand, you can treat D's, d's and T's as right-hand beats, and G's, g's and P's as left-hand beats.

Additional notes...
X=low note on bass drum or two-tone bell or percussion
x=any note on monotone percussion, or high note on two-tone percussion.
k=bell note when played with bass drum (jun-jun)
x=underlined note means stressed or accented.
(d)=parenthesis means optional note or way to play a given note

Example:

D - D - d g d g
Dun (rest) Dun (rest) do go do go

Click for sound: RealAudio - Track1-1

Each word in the above phrase has equal time. To get the feel of this or any rhythm, say the notes together, leaving pauses for the rests (each rest can be almost spoken, as if with a silent grunt). Try speaking it and playing it at the same time, and try it at different speeds to feel the effects of different tempos. This particular rhythm is a common phrase in a number of sixteen-beat rhythms; for example...

_______ _______ _______ _______ | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | D - d g - g d g D - D - d g d g

Click for sound: RealAudio - Track1-2

The notation form above, with the bars to aid in counting, is used in these rhythm lessons and in the book Roots Jam (vol. 1). It's easy to use either by handwriting or typing.

A variation, the so-called "box notation" method, is easier to follow visually, and is used in my second rhythm collection, Roots Jam 2. Notice also that the example below switches handing to lead with the "G":

1	.	*	.	2	.	*	.	3	.	*	.	4	.	*	.
G	-	g	d	-	d	g	-	G	-	G	-	g	d	g	d

Anchors and variations

The anchoring beats of most rhythms tend to come on the first beat of each measure. So in an eight-beat phrase like the example above, the anchoring beat is the D at the beginning. But there are also two four-beat measures in the eight, so a second main anchor comes on the d of beat number five. With the anchored beats underlined and perhaps played with a slight emphasis, the phrase looks like this:

D- D - d g d g

Click for sound: RealAudio - Track1-3

In conventional music terminology, the anchors mark the beginning of each quarter note, with each quarter note comprising four sixteenth notes.
Each four-beat phrase could also be divided in half, so that an anchor can be found on every other beat (all the left-hand beats in this case: 1, 3, 5, 7). These anchors become especially important when playing with a Latin or "swing" feel, which adds a subtle, virtual rest after each anchor beat (playing [d g] as if were a triplet, [d-g], in the same time-space). The consistent left-right alternation of hands is important to help regulate the timing especially when playing fast.
However, as mentioned above, it's helpful not to overuse the lead hand, especially in a straight-ahead rhythm like the example. So to balance the body's energy (and the feel of the phrase in a subtle way, since we're talking about human music here, not digital)--and since with the rests there's time for it--you can substitute the other hand for that second bass beat:

D - G - d g d g

Note that the anchor accents are gone now: not necessarily so, but only to illustrate another subtlety of phrasing. With the hands more balanced it makes sense to de-emphasize the anchors, spread the weight around.

Of Four-Four and other useful constructions

Returning to the sixteen-beat phrase given above

D - d g - g d g D - D - d g d g

Click for sound: RealAudio - Track1-2

and remembering the concept of quarter notes, we can recognize it now as that old stand-by, the four-four. With one crucial difference, which sets world-beat music apart from standard rock. Where the four-four would give us four anchors, one every four beats, the phrase above has a rest in the place of the second would-be anchor (between the first "g - g"s). This is the hitch that turns our hips, and turns us into real dancers, instead of static shakers. It's the key to the samba (where it occurs at hitching post number three instead of two as in this example) and to the Yelle (where it occurs at the fourth anchor spot instead).

Here, without changing the regular order of playing hands, the emphasis shifts from the lead hand to the off-beat or upbeat hand (beat number four, underlined):