yes alvin, i have learnt quite a lot too! especially how one should practice on the drumkit and their strokings. right now, i am trying to get the right stick holding position and getting all the fundamentals right before progressing on.
the most impt thing i have learnt so far is that one has to be patient and be disciplined when self-practicing. no easy way out if you want to be a great drummer i guess. for eg. going slow while doing single para-diddle and single stroke roll for mins without stopping, not even picking ur nose if its itchy! discipline and patience! haha.. when going slow, we can do an all round check on our stick holding and adjust accordingly. not only that, we can 'force' ourselves to do all the techniques correctly. when going fast, most likely one will lose control of sticks and practicing on the wrong techniques too. in the long run, the wrong techniques will become a bad habit and this is something that all of us should avoid. a good tempo to start will be 50bpm, doing semiquavers for 5 mins straight on practice pad. if possible, do it for 10 mins and even longer if you can! but of cos, give ur hands some break too=D
not only on the practice pad, playing grooves on the drumkit at 50bpm (WITH a metronome beeping semi-quavers) is a very good practice too. this is very useful for playing all the upbeats and all the subdivisions that you can play accurately. it is impt to let the metronome beep at semi-quavers as you do not have to "guess" where you have to place ur snare/bass upbeats but just nail it together with the metronome beeps. if the metronome is beeping the 8th notes, you have to guess where to place the upbeats and sometimes, the semi-quaver that you intend to play may become a part of a triplets etc etc.
i dunno how to explain and note down what i have learnt clearly, but i do hope this post would be useful to other drummers out there too! =D
