This won't necessarily help, but it's another opinion!

I'm just the opposite.  When I was in school (a few years back), the "matched" grip was completely frowned upon.  You were required to play with the traditional grip.  The only time I play matched grip is for the several bars that preceed a section with rim-clicks, this way I can just go straight to the snare without flipping the stick around RIGHT before.  I've tried playing matched grip every now and then and it just doesn't feel right after playing trad grip forever.  I also feel like I have a lot more control of my left hand with the trad grip than matched. YMMV

Good point!  I won't argue that a matched grip makes sense, when I first learned the traditional grip, it seemed odd to me, but that is the way I was taught (like I said, matched grip was severely frowned upon in the mid 60's) and it works very effectively for me.  There are times that I think that the grip has actually improved my left hand stroke (once again, I have no comparison to matched grip).

One of those "which works for you" things.  I would try to work on my matched grip, but I have no prevailing reasons to do so.  

Yeah, this is weird, but I've been playing the "unnatural" traditional way for so long that the "natural" way of playing with a matched grip now is totall "unnatural" to me.

Personally, I would hope that anyone who plans to incorporate both Traditional and Matched grip ... that they would practice with both grips ... more for the Left hand's sake than anything else.

The muscles used in Traditional are not the same ones used in Matched. The concept of the two grips is VERY different, so it only makes sense that since drumming is based upon muscle memory, that one would work on both if both are used.

You'll have a hard time changing my view on this ... if in fact, you have a different view.  

I just gotta throw out the fact that everyone knows traditional looks so much cooler than matched! I myself play both, when i play rock and things like it, i obviously play matched, and with jazz and other stuff traditional. For me, the whole point of me changing around is to keep the roots of drumming in me.... Just something about not knowing how to play traditional seems wrong. It may sound wierd to some of you, but it's just how i feel. Playing traditional to me keeps me close to the roots of percussion to when it first began... AND IT LOOKS WICKED COOL TOO!
There are no advantages or disadvantages to either, just what you're used to, and what you like, and what fits your style of play
Peace! Jeff

Good point Alan. It can be done, I've done it numerous times, however ... it's awkward and uncomfortable. Assuming you are playing the right side of the drum, you bring the left over the top of the drum, elbow pointing up to the ceiling, and lean your body to the right. That's why it's nice to have a bass drum stand that will allow you to tilt the drum to the angle you want. I'm not saying that you have to play it horizontal, but you can put a slight angle in the drum, to the left, which makes it VERY easy to play matched grip rolls.

It's controversial, but you can play the rolls with the left hand on the left side of the drum, right hand on the right side. I know it may go against the percussion "rule of thumb" ... but if it sounds good, who cares. The bass drum isn't a defined pitch, and if the drum is tuned well, it can sound good ... but at soft volumes.

I've also just gone ahead and used Traditional grip when playing the bass drum. I don't know exactly how often bass drum rolls occur in classical literature, but I've played a lot of the old repertoire, and it seems to be rare ... perhaps as much as 1% of classical literature (if that) calls for a roll on the bass drum.

Your point is well taken. All the more reason to be sure you are practicing both grips if you plan to have to use both.

Really? I always thought it was EASIER to do cross-sticks using traditional grip. All you have to do is flip your hand over.

When you play matched, you have to manage to get the stick turned around in your hand so that the tip of the stick will be touching the head when you go to a cross-stick. So I usually end up playing with the butt end for the rest of the song if I know I've got some cross-stick parts coming up.

Are you using the butt of the stick on the head for your cross-stick parts? I think you'll find you get a better sound using the tip.

When I first had "proper" lessons (in 1950) I was taught "traditional" because that is what it then was.....traditional!!  This debate about trad v matched or matched v trad is almost as old as I am and, while always hugely enjoyable and interesting, I don't think anyone ever comes up with a definitive answer.

When I was a little boy my first teacher (Denis Brady, then principal percussion BBC Concert Orchestra and an instructor at the Kneller Hall National Military Academy) told me that if you learned to play traditional you can transfer to matched easily but that it was very difficult to learn matched and then transfer to traditional.  I have always believed that and seen some evidence of it.

If I am teaching an absolute beginner, I teach traditional first just so that they know it.  If they later want to switch to matched (which many these days do) then that's fine by me because I think it very important that they play with what is the most comfortable grip for them.  I prefer playing traditional but I suspect that is partly (or perhaps wholly) psychological as that is what I was first taught and sweated over.  I was very slow: I found it very difficult and it was well over a year before I could do anything that sounded like a decent roll.

Also, and just a theory, I think at least some very young children (I was eight) don't have quite the wrist strength of older children like teenagers which makes things more difficult for them (although my daughter got on fine at that age).

As far as I am aware, traditional grip is still taught to military beginners in the UK and I know it is in the Czech Republic.  Perhaps someone knows whether that is so in the United States military academies?  

Mr Acrolite mentions the advent of adjustable marching slings which, of course, has revolutionised everything, except in military drumming.  There, you have to remember, much of the work is ceremonial and often they use specific ceremonial drums (this applies equally to the Grenadier Guards in England and the Castle Guard in Prague).  Often these are heavily embellished instruments and I can tell you from personal experience that some are extremely heavy.  The Grenadier Guards in England have one set from 1880 something of which large chunks are solid silver!!!  They were presented, I think, by Queen Victoria and their weight is astonishing.

None of these organisations are (so far) using  adjustable marching slings and as some of the shoulder slings/straps are in themselves ceremonial it is possible that they won't.  I appreciate that this concerns only a comparitively small number of people worldwide but there, at least, it seems likely that the traditional grip will be maintained.  Also I would point out that on some of these older drums they have a considerable "lip", as much as three inches sometimes.   In the Essex Regimental Museum there is a 17th century rope tensioned drum with a lip of about four inches.

If I have a student who expresses an interest in orchestral music then I think it should be taught.  Having said that I have good students of 15/16 years who are very skilled at matched snare and I would not attempt to change it at that age....it would take far too long and waste valuable lesson time.  I can play either traditional or matched but, as stated, I prefer traditional...this again is probably psychological but it always seems just a tiny bit easier to me to do a pp-mf-ff roll with traditional as the left hand stick (for me) slides just that bit easier towards the middle.  

I also believe that I have slightly better finger control with traditional...anyway I like it and I feel good with it and that's what matters.  It may simply be, as B-man pointed out, that the slightly different set of muscles involved happen to be more efficient for mein traditional.

What I do know is that there have been, and are, great players in either style and I certainly do not think there is a generic sound quality advantage of one over the other (except for the player involved).  

B-man is much younger than me (everyone is much younger than me) and he has the advantage, I suspect, of being easier able to contort himself to play a vertical Bass Drum with a matched grip!!!  (I think it would provoke one of those "What the hell are you doing?" looks if I tried it).  You are, of course, correct that there aren't many Bass Drum rolls in classical music although, curiously enough, they turn up far more frequently in film scores!  We can be quite sinister.   There is one rare piece (recorded in Czechoslovakia) by the French composer Ernest Fanelli which calls for huge bass drum rolls!!!  Sometimes there are some rhythmic patterns which are easier with two mallets (or I think so, anyway) and apropos nothing but because it is rather the Cinderella of the percussion department there is a gloriously subtle part in two works that I know: The Enchanted Lake by Liadov (which requires both bass drum and timpani rolls, none of them ever exceeding mf)  and the single mallet part in Elgar's beautiful Sea Pictures, the mostly subtle writing for the bass drum that I know.

Liadov's work is a masterpiece (not because of the percussion writing) and virtually the only thing that keeps his name in the repertoire.  Liadov started many works but finished few: he was drunk most of the time and was frequently carried home by Borodin/Rimsky-Korsakov and assorted helpers.

My view on traditional v matched (save for the exceptions I have mentioned) is that it should be what the player feels happiest with: if they feel happy with it, they will play better I would think.

That said, I would be sorry to see traditional disappear completely because it has served millions of players well through the centuries.  Things move on, however, and perhaps it is that matched better suits today's players, particularly with multi drum sets.

Kind regards,
Alan M. Watkins





 

 

Well, unfortunately your suspicions are correct. If you want to be good at both, you'll have to practice both (unless you've just got naturally talented hands, which I do NOT have). This also makes me reiterate my curiosity about why you even want to bother to learn to play traditional. I can understand a trad player wanting to learn matched, but not vice versa.

Are you gigging? If so, that's a great place to put both grips into practice. Simply alternate grips from one song to the next. Or, if the gig really dictates a certain grip, use it on the gig, and practice the other at home.

I didn't really practice traditional grip once I made the switch to matched. But I had enough gigs where I used it that it never really "rusted out." I recently started practicing it in earnest, since I'm fooling around with corps-style rudimental drumming, and the pad time I'm putting in has really helped.

But unless you really see a void in your ability to express yourself that only traditional can fill, I think your time might be better spent really polishing your matched grip. I can't think of anything you can't do with matched. And before Alan W. pipes up  , most concert bass drums I've played are suspended on tilting stands, so you can even roll on them that way.

But I know what it's like to just want to do something even if you don't have a totally logical reason. Like I said, it's a cool looking grip, and using it puts you in a certain headspace that's kinda cool - I won't deny that. You really want to master both grips? Be prepared to do some extra practicing!

Good point.  No, it doesn't look just like the right hand. I think Bart's suggestion of the physiology involved in both grips certainly comes into play.  I really don't see any reason to spend time learning both grips.  I use the trad grip because that's the way I was taught and that's the way a lot of players played in the 60's.  If you have a grip, trad or matched, and it's working for you, why bother learning the other?