Opening/Closing Hit-Hats | Drum Lessons
In this video lesson, you’re gonna learn how to open and close the high hats within simple rock beats. This maybe a little difficult to master at first, but once you have it down, it’s a great way to add spice to your favorite beats. Take a look at the provided sheet music, if you look at the last 8th note in beat one, you can see that there’s a small circle above that final note. This indicates that the high hats are to be open on that beat. So, right as you strike the high hats, you’ll open them up with your left foot. Here’s how that looks and sounds. Sometimes, notations will have a small plus sign on which you are to close the high hats, but wherever that is not present, as of the case in this page, you simply close the high hats on the next high hats stroke. So for this first beat, the next high hats stroke will be the one count when you repeat the groove. Let me demonstrate the first example for you now, pay close attention to when I open and close the high hats. Now, did you notice how the high hats are fully closed at the point when I strike them on the next beat, I don’t strike them as they are closing, but rather close them just a millisecond before striking that next note. Watch again as I demonstrate example two. Be sure you are completely synchronizing all the various limbs while playing these exercises. It helps to count out loud or at least have a clear count in your head while playing these. Watch again as I demonstrate the third example. Okay, the final example includes one new element that is the introduction of 16th note being played in the snare drum. Now, remember what I told you earlier, you always close the high hats on the next high hats stroke. So, this extra snare drum shot gets played while the high hats are still open. You don’t close them on the snare shot, but instead, continue to wait and close them on the following high hats stroke. I hope that wasn’t too confusing, but I’ll demonstrate it for you now so you can see exactly how this is to be played. Okay, there you have it, take this beats to your kit. And once you have them mastered, implement this new technique within some of your favorite beats. I think you’ll be pleased with the results.