Bass Drum Comping | Drum Lessons
In this video lesson, I wanna discuss jazz bass drum comping. And comping means to accompany or to compliment what’s happening in the song. Okay, I used my bass drum to comp with lower sounding instruments sometimes. Lower register on the piano, bass notes, trombones, those types of sounds. If we look at the sheet music provided, exercise number one, okay, you’re gonna play the jazz ride pattern on the cymbal, high hats on two and four, and your bass drum is gonna play on the let of every beat. One trip – let, two trip – let, three trip – let, four trip – let. Let me play this one for you, so you can hear how it sounds. Okay, exercise number two, check this one out. We’re actually gonna play the bass drum on the middle triplet of each quarter note. One trip – let, two trip – let, three trip – let, four trip – let. Be sure not to rush this one. It’s really easy to misplace or put that bass drum on the wrong note. Listen to this one. Exercise number three, we put the bass drum on beat one and also on the last two triplets of beat three, check this out. Exercise number four, now this one is consistent, because you’re gonna put the bass drum on the last two triplet of beat one and the last two triplets of beat three. Watch how this one sounds. Exercise number five, now take a close look at this one, because we have bass drums that are scattered throughout the beat a little bit. The first bass drum is on the trip of beat one. The next series of bass drum are all three triplets of beat three, three trip – let. And the final bass drum is on the last triplet of beat four. Be very patient with this one. Watch how this one sounds. Number six is a very cool little bass drum comping beat, because the bass drum almost becomes poly rhythmic. It feels like a six against four poly rhythm. The bass drum is on the one, on the let of one, on the trip of two, on the three, on the let of three and on the trip of four. Watch this one, if it sounds like you’re playing it wrong, you’re probably playing it right. Watch this. That concludes the portion of jazz bass drum comping. Now I hope you had fun watching this, coz I sure had fun playing them.