Fills
A FILL is any variation of stick movements from the basic beat used to fill out color the music.
Fills are usually found at the beginning and ending of songs, at the end of certain bars (i.e., when the song changes from verse to chorus and vice-versa), or when leading into an instrumental. There are no set rules for fills, but they must be in time with the piece of music you are playing and tastefully played. Any part of the drum kit can be used, with rolls around the tom-toms and crashing cymbals being very common.
DYNAMICS (the varying degrees of softness and loudness in music) play an important role in music as they add color and feeling.
It is important to note that you don’t need to put every fill you know into one break as some of the best sounding fills are the ones with the least amount of playing in them. You will find that most fills come at the end of every 4, 8, 12, or 16 bars, with the fill taking up the last 1 or 2 beats of the bar of the whole last bar, e.g., in a 12 bar progression you might play the standard beat for 11 bars and use a fill in the last bar to lead back into a repeat of the progression.
In these exercises we will combine a beat with a fill, with the fill taking up 1 or 2 beats of the bar.
In these exercises we will use fills taking up all 4 beats in the bar with the preceding 3 bars being a basic beat.
Solo 2
