Why The "Take Five" Drum Beat Is So Great?
The memorable and hooky melody of Take Five helped bring
jazz to the masses in the late 50's. It was all over US radio at a time when
rock'n'roll was taking hold. This song features an extended drum solo, made
even greater by the fact that it's played in the time signature of 5/4!
Joe Morello is criminally overlooked as a great drummer of
this era but his economy and swing put him firmly on the map as one of the
greatest Jazz players of all time!
How To Play It
This is the very fist bar of the song. The whole tune is
played in the time signature 5/4. This means that there are five counted beats
to every bar.
The same ride cymbal pattern is maintained during most of
the tune and can be thought of as an extended version of the more traditional
Jazz Ride Cymbal pattern. Extended by one extra beat.
Look out for the rather tasty snare drum ghost notes on the
second and third partial of the triplet in beat 4. These two snare drum notes
slide into beat 1 in a really satisfying manner.
Of course being Jazz, Joe changes this drum beat throughout
the song. Joe improvises with the pattern, adding and subtracting notes to
accompany the music. Sometimes only the snare drum on the '+' of beat 2 is
accented and sometimes no snare drums at all are accented.
It's worth mentioning that during live performance, Joe
developed a stepped hi-hat pattern for the foot. In the early days he would
step the hi-hat on beats 2 and 4 of the bar but in later performances added a
note on beat 5 as well. A truly impressive technique to perform, especially
when improvising over the top of it.
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