Paradiddle Cheat Sheet 1

For beginners, here is the first in a series of Cheat Sheets.

• The Single Paradiddle
• The Double Paradiddle
• The Paradiddle-Diddle (both left and right-handed versions)

The first order of business is to learn these hand patterns cold. Don’t worry about speed at first, just get to the point where you can play the pattern itself effortlessly and at will, without any papers to look at when playing. For now, forget about the accents. The little symbol that looks like an arrow above some of the notes means to play that note louder. Ignore those symbols at first. Just learn the hand patterns.

After you can play the patterns pretty well, try playing the accented notes louder than the unaccented notes. You should be able to play each pattern with or without the accents.

Later, we’ll mess around with moving the accents around to different places. But for now, just learn these. They will serve you well.

Here’s the PDF: Paradiddle Cheat Sheet 1

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Mark Feldman

Mark Feldman is a professional drummer based in NYC. He first gained attention as one of the winners of Modern Drummer magazine's very first drum solo contest, judged by Rush's Neil Peart. He's played with Alison Krauss, Curtis Stigers, Emily Remler, Joel Hoekstra, GE Smith, Andy York, Marshall Crenshaw, Tony Shanahan, The Drifters, The Marvelettes, Big Brother and The Holding Company, and many other artists. His band, LEVEL5, is releasing their debut, "The Sybil EP," on February 22nd, 2019. The EP features Oz Noy on guitar and Will Lee on bass.

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