So essentially the story goes, I did the (arguably) silly thing of striving for developing speed over good technique. My single stroke roll on my hands got to about the speed of 16ths at 250 bpm but the technique in my left hand is AWFUL. While my right hand plays mostly fingers and feels very comfortable and loose, my left uses primarily wrist, and I unintentionally tense all up my arm even to my shoulder on my left side when playing at higher speeds, mostly stuff like blast beats. The faster I push to, the more it tenses, and I'd been beginning to notice I'd been getting a very sore shoulder after playing because I'd been tensing that much.
A few days ago I was having one of those off days that every drummer gets, where our brains just aren't connecting to our hands and feet properly. So I decided I was going to have a bit of a break for the day. That's when i noticed the pain in my shoulder was worse than it ever was. So I decided to break out the old practice pad and practice some of these strange rudiment things I've mostly been stubbornly neglecting these days
I've decided to take myself right back to basics and drill better technique into my left hand. I got out my old book "Rudiments and Motions, Snare Drumming up close" by Frank Corniola, And I'm planning on working through that.
So anyway my question is. What kind of difference would practicing rudiments with heavier sticks make? At the moment I've started doing rudimental practice with a pair of Pro Mark Jeff Moore signature sticks, as they're quiiiiiiite darn heavy sticks.
I'm not sure if you can see very well that I'm using a lot of wrist, not a lot of fingers and tensing my arm from this video, but here's a video of me playing, if it helps anyone develop some more specific hints or tips.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpmtmXc6Wb0&feature=plcp
Thanks for reading, everyone!
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