Throwing The Flam

• By Terence Higgins
• Originally published in the August 2012 issue of DRUM! Magazine

The flam is a fundamental rudiment and a part of the N.A.R.D 13 Essential Rudiments Of Drumming (aka, the drummer’s bible; aka, the building blocks of a sound rudimental drumming foundation). In this lesson, I have put together a few short but effective exercises that illustrate a few simple ways to apply the flam to the drum set. When approaching these exercises, be sure to use the same tap stroke — rL or lR — to get the flam effect. And once you’ve blazed through these exercises a few times, try to get creative and add other flam rudiments such as the flam accent, flam paradiddle, Swiss Army triplets, and any other flam you can think of.