The Drum Machine - Lessons - Double Bass Drums

Assuming you've found a comfortable seating height and practical set up configuration. There are a number of physical problems & technique issues .

Some Basic Tips

Seating is probably the most important issue for double bass drummers. Firstly make sure your stool is stable, you don't want it to move and cause you balance problems while both feet are playing, next make sure your not sitting too close or too low !!! Try and position your kicks and pedals so that at a comfortable angle to your body, Personally I like at about 15 to 20 degrees each side of center.

The weaker leg is the other issue that comes up time and time again, so how can we develop it ?.

Since, speed and endurance are the real issues here, we'll need to condition each leg singular as well as together, just like we work on our hands. You can do with via using various fixed development patterns either in 8th, triplets or 16th notes.
          
  1/8th notes        1/8th triplets         16th Notes
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +  1 + a 2 + a 3 + a 4 + a  1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
R R R R R R R R  R R R R R R R R R R R R  RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR  
L L L L L L L L  L L L L L L L L L L L L  LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL
R L R L R L R L  R L R L R L R L R L R L  RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL
R R R R L L L L  R R R L L L R R R L L L  RRRRLLLLRRRRLLLL
          
          

Choose the perfect footwear, this can be quite personal thing, but for me, I don't like the sole of my shoe to flex. I find that's it's more helpful when my shoes are a little more rigid. This seem very helpful when using 'heal toe' technique. So experiment with your footwear! It does make a difference!

Speed Metal / Grind Players

A popular warm up trick for death metal (grind) drummers in the Australian scene, is to apply Deep Heat a few minutes before going on stage. This will loosen your leg and angle muscles up, and should allow for all most instant results.

In case your not familiar with "deep heat" it's normally used by sports people to help ease the pain of muscle strains and cramps

Ankle Weights, during practice sessions use ankle weights to help condition your lower body. Personally, I don't recommended this...but a lot metal players do.. If your going to try this, please start out using very light weights, or if you have a set of old skateboarding knee pads, just slide them down your ankles and use those as a weight. Too much weight and you can damage your muscles, so be careful.

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