Double - Bass Concepts:Hand-Foot

Combination Patterns

by Joe Franco

A popular concept in double-bass drumming is breaking up 16thnotes between both hands and both feet. For example:H = Hands F = Feet

These and similar patterns can be used as one-bar fills or can berepeated and combined with each other to form extended fills andsolos. When playing a hand-foot combination pattern as a fi l l , orwhen combining these patterns, it is desirable to play the lead(dominant) hand and foot on the downbeat of 1 of the followingmeasure. By using the following system, this will always occur: (1)Play all 8th notes (1&2&3&4&) with the right hand or foot. (2) Playall E's and A's with the left hand or foot. (Left-handed players willreverse this system.) By using this system, the dominant hand/footwill always play the downbeat of 1, and each following note willalternate as R, L,R, L,R, L, regardless of whether it is played withthe hand or foot. The above patterns wil l be played as:

This system can be applied to 8th-note triplets by playing:

Here are examples of triplet patterns:

You can reverse all of these patterns by playing the hands' partwith the feet and vice versa. The R's and L's will remain the same.

Practice playing these patterns with both hands on the snare.Then try breaking up the hands on the different sound sources inyour ki t . Try applying them as one-bar fills. Once you are familiarwith them, try repeating and combining them as extended fills andsolos. Experiment with your own patterns.