[ARSCLIST] Rock and roll drumming

[Eric Goldberg <ericgoldie@xxxxxxxxxx>]

> O boy, I hope I don't regret replying to this but I am seeing some
> nonsense in the opinions on this thread. 
>
> Regarding Rock and Roll rhythms: Lots of rock and roll has the strong
> beats on 2 and 4, sometimes it's on the 1 and 3 but almost always there
> is the rhythm of 2 and 4 meaning some instrument is strongly accenting
> that.  And of course, all rock and roll has its basis in black music as
> it stewed in the American experience.


Or as Duke Ellington said, "Pop your fingers on two and four, one and 
three is considered too aggressive".

Many of the drummers with the earliest rock bands were not good 
players, so on recordings some great pros were brought in. These 
included Connie Kay, Panama Francis, Don Lamond and others of their 
ilk. They played the music as they saw fit, and then the young rock 
drummers would copy the records.

> As far as drummers not being competent - they invented the feel in the
> sense that it grew out of blues and gospel and that derivative music
> that was played in the clubs became rock and roll. The temp got cranked
> up and the downbeats took over. I do not buy this drummers-not-competent
> thing at all!  They weren't trying to play Benny Goodman or Glenn Miller
> you know.  Those drummers were playing exactly what they intended to
> play.  We may as well say the Ray Charles couldn't play piano well
> because he wasn't playing Beethoven sonatas.

The major change from the swing feel was from the triplet feel on the 
quarter to the straight eighths. Feel is very, very, very, very, very 
important which explains why the Bo Diddley rhythm, although it is 
notated exactly like clave, feels so completely different from the 
"son montuno".

If everything I wrote in this last paragraph doesn't make sense to 
anyone, then all I can do is quote Fats Waller as he left the 
bandstand and was asked what jazz was. He replied, "Lady, if you 
don't know by now, don't mess with it".

Eric Goldberg