The Drum Machine - Drum Lessons - Getting started - Grip Selection

Traditional grip is more difficult to develop an initial technique with, mainly because both hands are required to learn completely different grips in fact. Although surprisingly enough some people find it easier..

For a right handed player, your right hand holds the stick in Matched fashion, while your left uses the cross stick grip, which when combined give us traditional. I'm unsure of the actual history behind this approach, although I believe it originated from marching band percussionists, and then migrated to drum set performers with the evolution of the modern drum set.

The Steps - O.K. Lets Grab A Stick

		*Step 1:* Open your Hand with the Palm facing down ward, Extend your fingers and thumb fully.
		*Step 2:* To hold the stick, place it between your thumb and first finger, this becomes the primary cradle of this grip. Hold the stick about 2 inches (5/6 center meters) from butt.
		Step 3: Roll your hand over, let the stick drape across your hand.
		Step 4: Now, move your thumb so that's slightly hooked, for two reasons, your thumb actually helps control the stick when in motion and secondly it further helps secure the stick in it's cradle. The stick is positioned between your 2nd and 3rd fingers, your first and second finger are also used to control the sticks motion. (as well as your wrist and thumb)

Moving The Stick With Traditional Grip

There seems to be various trains of thought on the "correct" way to do this, of course we need to remember that there's a vast number different approaches out there, which are all valid. They may or may not work for you.

Wrist Rotation - The idea here is that your wrist rotates (out ward) to raise the stick and then contracts inward to deliver the note. You can use your forearm also, to vary the dynamic (volume) control.

Thumb Control - Here the idea is that your thumb handles the rebounding or continuous motion of the stick. once you've played a note, let the stick rebound back, then via using only your thumb (and a tiny bit of wrist), you can push the stick down to play another note. This can be a great development exercise, probably Easiest to master on a really hard surface first, like a table or bench top, once you can do this, try it on the drums. It certainly takes some work to be able to do this around the kit, particularly on the larger floor toms.

Finger Control - Similarly to thumb control you can also control the rebound of the stick, via using your index and second finger, this is done via a pulling down motion of those two fingers. To better facilitate this the wrist rotates slightly. To develop this use same approach as the thumb control.

Obviously, these are only quick overviews, you can also combine techniques together.. Try them out and see what makes sense to you...

To better incorporate tradition technique on the drum set, here's some ideas to help make it easier.

Tilt your snare drum, if your right handed, this means that the left hand edge of your snare is raised higher than the right hand side, this better facilitates your access to the rim for rim shots (power strokes) and lessens the potential interference with your left leg.
Tilt your toms, in the same fashion, for much the same reason ;)
Position your toms, so that the first drum is slightly higher then and the next drum and so on, this makes it easier to maintain rolls around the drums. Don't think of this as a purely physical thing, let gravity aid you !