Exercise # 3: “Splashing the hi hat using the hi hat pedal”

Crashing a cymbal at the same time as striking the bass drum works great if you want to really emphasize something in a big way. But what if you want to give a scaled down version of the same effect and not disrupt the flow of your “time” on the ride cymbal or stirring of brushes on a snare? One way is to “splash” the hi-hat cymbals together by working the hi hat pedal. The sound is different than if you struck the cymbals using a stick or brush and that is a good thing. It gives you another color to play around with. 

So what is “splashing”? 

Starting with the hi hat cymbals apart, you depress the hi hat pedal to bring the cymbals together and than back off on the pedal to let the cymbals ring freely. The distance the cymbals are apart can effect volume as can the force with which you depress the pedal.

Controlling these “splashes” involves practice and so I developed this exercise to help you work on that. The written “X” is the “splashing” of the hi hat cymbals. Again, let the cymbals ring once splashed.

The ride cymbal should be played throughout. (I didn't write past the first measure as not clutter the page). You can play this exercise with sticks or brushes.

If you want to practice more exercises related to this, pick up a copy of Ted Reed’s fantastic book called “syncopation”. You can adapt many of the pages from, say, page 29 to 44 (depending on the edition) to work out more exercises.
Here’s how:

• Looking at Ted Reed's book, disregard what he wrote for the bass drum. Only look at the snare drum part.
• Now play the snare drum part on the bass drum.  Use swung 8ths (essentially the first and 3rd note of a triplet).
• Fill in the missing notes of each triplet with the snare drum
• Add hi hat splashes to all written quarter notes (and notes with ties)
• The free hand (normally the right hand if you’re right-handed) plays the jazz ride pattern.

Have fun with this and experiment with the idea of “splashing” in other circumstances.
You can add such beautiful expressive “color” and shape to your playing using the “splash”. It can be dramatic or really subtle. Combined with brush playing, you’ll love the results!

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