well... today was an eye opener. never saw someone love life and love drums so much... that someone is Mr Hernandez.
his playing that night was quite deep... quite difficult to understand at first until a more continuous flow of playing kicks in and well... i thought it was a nice intro
the other time at another clinic, i felt the drumming was quite excessive... here it was quite compact... although the first 3 minutes did not make much sense to me...
... until he explained in depth the different ways of manipulating the clave and i understood his genius...
the guy's insane. it was so clean and so crisp and so tight... it sounded impossible but well to that guy, impossible is nothing. his left foot was running 2-3, 3-2 rhumba claves while his right leg switched from pattern to pattern... his right and left hand coordinated to play songos...
and that was just one part of the solo...
something that i noticed was that he was really having fun he had a childlike enthusiasm in everything he did in the clinic. he really treasures people and really spent time with every fan who came to him for an autograph or to take a photo with him, exchanging a few words and exchanging warm, tight handshakes with them, while maintaining eye contact all the time. could tell that he is really sincere in all that he does. he has a great sense of humour too. gave out a pair of drumsticks to the person who was asked if he was married (he is, btw)
the only draw backs were that he did not teach as much, and he did not play to a track. one amazing thing that happened was as follows though...
he got one half of the audience sitting on the first floor to play the first 1st 3 notes of the 3-2 clave. the rest on the second floor played the last 2 notes.
using us as a human metronome, he went on to play on the various percussion instruments... then shifted to the drumset and did insane things... while playing to our 3-2 claps.
he loved every moment of it, and so did we.
to end it all, he played an instrument that Bob Marley used when he was alive and he played this song about angels. it sounded like harp. it was the most unique way to end a drum clinic: drummer playing a very beautiful song on a non-percussion instrument
well, Mr Hernandez taught more than drumming. he taught how to love life and really have fun in drumming and music.
thank you for coming down, sir i won't forget this night
"Drums are LIFE! el Negro"
his playing that night was quite deep... quite difficult to understand at first until a more continuous flow of playing kicks in and well... i thought it was a nice intro
the other time at another clinic, i felt the drumming was quite excessive... here it was quite compact... although the first 3 minutes did not make much sense to me... ... until he explained in depth the different ways of manipulating the clave and i understood his genius...
the guy's insane. it was so clean and so crisp and so tight... it sounded impossible but well to that guy, impossible is nothing. his left foot was running 2-3, 3-2 rhumba claves while his right leg switched from pattern to pattern... his right and left hand coordinated to play songos...
and that was just one part of the solo...
something that i noticed was that he was really having fun
he had a childlike enthusiasm in everything he did in the clinic. he really treasures people and really spent time with every fan who came to him for an autograph or to take a photo with him, exchanging a few words and exchanging warm, tight handshakes with them, while maintaining eye contact all the time. could tell that he is really sincere in all that he does. he has a great sense of humour too. gave out a pair of drumsticks to the person who was asked if he was married (he is, btw) the only draw backs were that he did not teach as much, and he did not play to a track. one amazing thing that happened was as follows though...
he got one half of the audience sitting on the first floor to play the first 1st 3 notes of the 3-2 clave. the rest on the second floor played the last 2 notes.
using us as a human metronome, he went on to play on the various percussion instruments... then shifted to the drumset and did insane things... while playing to our 3-2 claps.
he loved every moment of it, and so did we.
to end it all, he played an instrument that Bob Marley used when he was alive and he played this song about angels. it sounded like harp. it was the most unique way to end a drum clinic: drummer playing a very beautiful song on a non-percussion instrument
well, Mr Hernandez taught more than drumming. he taught how to love life and really have fun in drumming and music.
thank you for coming down, sir
i won't forget this night "Drums are LIFE! el Negro"
