anyone do any kind of "drill"?

[Guest petesasqwax]

I'm meaning like a regime of cutting - a regular practice routine.

Thinking about other disciplines - most of them advocate regular forms of practice in order to maintain skills in all areas. Think - martial arts forms, for example.

Does anyone do this and, if so, what do you do?

I'm thinking that my previous "spend however long doing whatever I feel like" methods might not be the most effective and a more structured approach might be more beneficial, long term.

[doppelkorn]

I wouldn't mind people's thoughts on this. I've decided to do some proper scratch learning once my course is finished and am thinking about setting myself a structured training regime.

[Jimmy]

i guess it depends on what your goal is: enjoyment or progression?

 

(not that the two are exclusive)

[Guest petesasqwax]

Likewise. I've been neglecting my cuts for a while but started to rectify that last night. It's been months since I had a cut and whilst most things were still fine, I noticed that my fast stabs were really sloppy on the pull back cut off. I don't want to aimlessly cut away with no real focus because I don't think that's going to be the most beneficial approach. I was thinking of maybe working through the DIY DVDs as some kind of starting point by am interested to know what others do

Jimmy - progression, big time

[d00ban]

My cuts and even flow are deffo better if I've spent a few hours drilling a new cut. Sometimes I still just practice stabs constantly just speed up the beat I'm cutting on incrementally, it seems to really help with how clean your cuts sound. Tears also seem to have a huge effect on my record control and the sounds I'm able to get out. I don't tend to get long amounts of time to practice these days though which makes doing these things pretty difficult.

[mfsop]

There are lots of articles on this for all kinds of instruments, for example this one http://carlalbrecht.com/2012/01/a-drummers-practice-routine/

 

I feel like you can adopt a lot from such articles. Like: Structure your practice into time segments, start with something you know and do it very slowly, try to achieve a certain "feel" (more so than a technique), practice new patterns to different beats, observe your hand/breathing technique, do something you're uncomfortable with, freestyle to your favorite loops...Switch between sections you like and sections you don't.

 

Honestly, I've never really stuck to a rigid scratch practice regimen but most educational books give you some advice in that fashion so it should work. Mostly I just play around and after a while I try some things that I think need the most work but a structured approach should lead to quicker results.

[Guest petesasqwax]

Yeah, that's the thing - I feel like I've been doing this (albeit with chunks of time off here and there) since I was 18 and I could be world class if I'd spent all the time more wisely. Just looking at the QSU guys illustrates what is possible in a short period of time, with the correct approach. Maybe QSU is worth a look? I dunno.

That link is excellent btw - much appreciated. Maybe I should look into using that kind of thing as a basis - drawing information from other sources in order to create some kind of scratch specific programme

[savwar]

I'm trying a new juggling routine... but no one cares about that so i'll shut up...

 

but i'm interested to hear what anyone does, as i'm finally scratching quite often after about 3-4 years of barely doing anything.

[Guest petesasqwax]

Based on the link mfsop put up, I'm just putting something together now that I'm going to try tonight. I'll happily share it with folk once I've done if anyone is interested

[Jacken]

Right now I'm not practice that often but when I had a chance I like to practice my stabs and chirps on some ultra fast electro beat for 10-15 minutes in a row. It's hard but it gives me much more improvement that 2 hour freestyle session.

[Guest petesasqwax]

I've put this together as a rough start - interested to know what people make of it:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/20750625/PeteSasqwax-ScratchPractice.pdf

 

Jacken - I should consider doing that superfast stabbing practice myself. On last night's evidence, my stabs are my weakest area right now!

[mfsop]

Say, did you just write all of this in two hours? This puts the rate at which I'm writing even more to shame.

Anyway, great job so far - This thread has just been miyagiized^TM

[Guest petesasqwax]

Ha - yeah, I just wrote it off the top of my head, but it's been kicking around in my brain for a while. It needs a lot more added to it, obviously, and I think introducing TTM stuff in there would help a lot in terms of identifying the various scratches we're working through (personally, I find it easier to visualise some scratches using TTM than by explaining in sentences) but it's a work in progress type of thing. Got to start somewhere & all that. I'm going to try it out tonight and see where we get to. In future, if anyone would be interested, I could put together some loopers focusing on the kind of beats I'm talking about in the pdf. I'll probably do it for my own use so it'd be easy enough to upload if people wanted it

[djdiggla]

i guess it depends on what your goal is: enjoyment or progression?

 

(not that the two are exclusive)

 

I wanna learn Jimmy's spazoid cut. It could be amazing if he sticks with it.

[Guest petesasqwax]

for anyone who might find it useful, I made a VERY basic looper just for simple practice routines. It has super simple beats (each bar goes: kick - closed hihat - snare - closed hihat - kick - closed hihat - snare - closed hihat) in a tempos from 70bpm to 100bpm (in 5bpm increments). I put both organic and synthetic kits in there just for some variety but they're literally just pure drums loops designed to provide a metronome for cut practice.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/20750625/Practice1.swf?dl=1

At the end of the 4th bar the closed hihat is replaced with an open one, just to signify the end of each 4 bar sequence. I left it in swf so that it can be opened in your web browser and run on whatever you use (PC/Mac etc.)

[Guest broke]

Wax - did you not get Focus's SPP looper, with the pitch control? You load your own loops into it. Perfect for learning a new scratch.

[chile]

I just posted in a skratchworx thread thats kinda on a similar topic - http://www.skratchlounge.com/index.php?/topic/11317-scratch-dojo-tactics/page__pid__98571&do=findComment&comment=98571

[Guest petesasqwax]

Broke - yeah man, it's funny you mention that. I'd lost it and spent ages looking through my hard disk before eventually discovering it on my laptop. I was debating whether it would be worth just putting up simple wav loops for people to use with the focus looper but I ultimately settled on making an swf version as it seemed like the easiest way to do it. it works on anything that can run a web browser and just pressing the buttons to skip between bpms felt like the simplest way to go. plus I've got a touch screen on my laptop so it's easier to just press a button on the screen (for me personally)

Chile - yeah, I posted up on skratchlounge too as I know there are some guys who post here but not there and vice-versa. seemed like a good idea at the time but now I've got 2 threads about the same thing in 2 different places... which seems like an idiotic thing to have done, it retrospect.

[Guest It'sPhilFromThursdays]

 

i guess it depends on what your goal is: enjoyment or progression?

 

(not that the two are exclusive)

 

I wanna learn Jimmy's spazoid cut. It could be amazing if he sticks with it.

 

 

He's stopped for the moment

 

He said wasn't enjoying scratching at the mo', but i was badgering him to keep at it at SSS, cos i like his vibrating styles, it's quirky and interesting. KEEP ON VIBRATING, VIBRATING JIM!

[Jimmy]

thanks beys <3

[scottie(the)goonie]

I do "floating" 16th (analogous to snare drum rudiments). Choose two techniques, as long as they can be played in some sort of 16 note continuous succession (does not have to be 16th notes though)

For example, chirps © and babies (b):

 

The pattern goes like this:

 

| b C C C | C b C C | C C b C | C C C b | .... It's more of a mental exercise than a physical one. Same can be done in 3's | A x x | x A x | x x A |...

 

A more complicated one is trying to cram 5 notes where there should only be 4 ( 2-click + 2 tears), keeping it in square time of course.

[Guest petesasqwax]

I like that method and can definitely see the merit in it. Transition drills

[Vekked]

I basically make a list of all my weaknesses or all the things I wanna learn better, and I often refer to it when I'm looking for something to practice on. I usually make BPM references like I can do something comfortably at 90BPM and my goal is 100BPM if it's a speed issue. If it's just getting something clean I write that down and just try to get it to where I can throw it in when I want to so it's actually useable.

 

I don't have specific drills other than focusing on the stuff on my weaknesses (stuff on my list) and avoiding doing other stuff. If I wanna practice chirps I do ONLY chirps. I don't really drill stuff that I'm comfortable with. I think constantly focusing on your weaknesses and consciously trying to make them strengths is the way to go... but at the same time not EVERY weakness, like if there's something you don't really like/wanna be good at then don't practice it. I'm not in the same boat as the guys who wanna learn every single scratch, I'd rather just focus on the ones I like.

[Guest petesasqwax]

I'm not in the same boat as the guys who wanna learn every single scratch, I'd rather just focus on the ones I like.

that's a valid point and I think that's a key reason why everyone will practice somewhat differently - it's easy to assume that everyone wants to do every scratch, but that's quite clearly not the case. I can think of a few scratches that I find too difficult to integrate with my style of scratching to do much so I don't practice those a lot, much as I quite like the sound they produce. I can only do hydroplanes if I move the record with my fader hand and hydroplane with my record hand, for example, which is awkward to incorporate into any kind of combo.

[Vekked]

I believe that what you choose not to learn is just as important as what you choose to learn in terms of developing style.

IMO Q-bert popularized the idea that you wanna learn every scratch because every one is like a word, and you wanna have the biggest vocabulary possible. I think it's not like that at all... I've heard enough crazy ill DJs who only do a few cuts but have mastered them to know that it's not about learning the most techniques. This is my go to counter example to that theory:

DJ Jeff rocks chirps and the same sample for a huge portion of this but it's expressive and funky as fuck. So if he can rock chirps like this with very little repetition, how come kids who know every scratch on Skratchlopedia Breaktannica sound repetitive? Because it's not about learning every cut on the TTM spread sheet and ticking them off. It's about beasting with the cuts you do have.

Disclaimer: I'm guilty as fuck for being one of the learn every scratch mother fuckers but it took learning nearly every named scratch for me to realize having 1 variation of 50 different techniques is way less valuable than having 50 variations of 1 technique. WORD.