Rick Dior gives a lot a material to work on between lessons. But I'm up to the challenge. So, I've organised my practice along the picture above. Not included is practice away from the instrument, namely deep listening, and band rehearsal, two key ingredients to making progress. 

1. Warmups. This takes about 20 minutes using Rick's instructions and hand outs. 
2. Technique. I work on his bebop pattern sheet by playing it along to recordings from the jazz canon or using a bass player from iReal pro. 
3. Brazilian, Latin, Funk, and Rock patterns from either books or transcriptions. These are areas of weakness that need to be removed if I'm going to be an effective drummer in the Metropolitan Silver Band. 
4. Sightreading. I'm an expert sight reader, so I don't spend more than a few minutes on this activity. 
5. Lifting drum figures and licks from recordings and YouTube videos. I usually do this in response to some need of the Metropolitan Silver Band or Kerr Street Big band. 
6. I work on weak areas of the repertoire for upcoming concerts with the Metropolitan Silver Band. 
7. I conclude by playing along with at least one track from a reputable source to conclude my practice. 

I practice everything with the metronome and evaluate my results through listening back or reading the score on my Roland practice app that is built into my TD-27 Sound module. 

It works as advertised. I'm now able to quickly change surfaces without exchanging sticks with beaters. However, when time allows, I can still play the triangle with a beater in the old fashioned way. 

Last week percussionist Rick Dior showed me how to set it up and even do rolls on it. 

​David

I've been working with Rick Dior since December 2023. A recent assignment was Wilcoxon's Rhythmania. Starting slowly, I've worked it up to this tempo.