Little Breakthroughs

The past week has had a good share of enlightening moments. It started last Saturday in Kitchener at the KW Knitters Fair. My wife and I setup as vendors, selling our Cashmere yarn and complimentary products. It's a fairly big publicly attended event catered to Knitters, etc and we always do well selling our products. While I was tending our booth, I noticed that many of the ladies walking through were wide-eyed with beaming smiles. During a conversation with one woman who was looking at our products, I pointed out that everyone seemed to be very happy. She said to me that, for knitters, being able to walk around a huge venue full of wonderful fibre that they can experience with all of their senses - it was better than chocolate!  'nuf said.
In the quiet moments that day, I was trying to figure out what I needed to do to improve my drum rolls - particularly the left hand.  Nothing was entering my little head, so we packed up and headed home - 2 hour drive to find a sick yearling cashmere goat when we landed at the farm. An after hours Vet call was necessary, but luck was with us and our Vet was on call. The goat was successfully saved and is recovering nicely. 
Throughout the next week I read and watched videos of drummers playing and teaching drum rolls. After watching some Buddy Rich I was particularly intrigued with the four-stroke he plays with his left hand. He plays traditional grip, but I play matched grip, so watching his technique or instructional video for traditional grip does not help me. 
By Tuesday I had not found any helpful info and decided to try to figure something out on my own.  One of the traditional grip techniques that I came across had you move your second and third finger back and forth under the stick to create an extra bounce at a quick pace. I tried to apply that thinking to my matched grip left hand and came up with an idea to squeeze the second, third and pinky finger up into my palm in a sequential order. The technique would be as follows: play the first stroke normally, action the first bounce with the second finger, action the second bounce with the third finger and action the third bounce with the pinky. That will create a four-stroke roll that can be played quickly - with enough practice. I grabbed a stick and hit the bed and tried the new idea. My fingers were either completely uncooperative or just plain spastic. But I felt it could work, so I kept at it. The more practice, the less spastic and the more cooperative.  I only had time to practice a few minutes at a time a couple of times a day.
My practice time was limited by the work I was doing at my `real` job. I was assigned a project to install and configure the relatively new Virtual Desktop management tool called VDI-in-a-Box from Kaviza (now owned by Citrix). I have built other Desktop Virtualization environments, but it was a first for me with VIAB. Also this week I was migrating, transitioning a client`s messaging server from a stand-alone box to a fully fault-tolerant and load balanced solution. I learned much.
That gets me to the whole point of this blog post. After a week of limited but efficient practice, I improved my double and quad-stroke roles greatly. I was enlightened by many great drummers old and new, Buddy Rich, Peter Erskine, a few unknowns on Youtube and Gil Sharone. If you haven`t heard or seen Gil Sharone - google him! 
 I found a way to improve my speed and consistency and now have a great technique to practice (and practice).  
My `little breakthrough`at the end of the week came when I was practicing to random songs on my MP3 player (Blackberrry Torch). I have a playlist of songs I want to practice as they have some techniques I like to work on. I always choose shuffle and jam out to what ever starts playing.  After warming up with four stroke rolls at 114bpm I started the MP3`s. Ex Girlfriend by No Doubt blasted through my headphones first. I can`t think of any specific technique i want to practice in that song - I just  LOVE playing it. A Led Zeppelin song and a couple of Rush songs played, then Tight Rope by the late great Stevie Ray. For as long as I can remember that song has made me sing and play air drums and other weird stuff.  But I have never been able to grasp the groove the drummer is playing. The shuffle is thick and has been elusive for me. The Snare strokes never seem to stop, like he`s playing the snare with both hands - but there is a sweet high-hat pattern on top. When I started playing to it that night - I had it. The four-stroke roll is the technique that makes that song, and I was able to play it - for the first time EVER. My stroke is nowhere as smooth, but I had it - which means I can practice and improve it until it does sound as good. 
Drumming is about making small strides throughout a lifetime of playing, always trying to improve just a little bit at a time. It`s those little breakthroughs that keep me interested.

Luck vs Success

"I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have."
~ Thomas Jefferson

 When I first read this I thought it made sense, however as I contemplated some more I began to realize it's just a motivational phrase. I have had some luck, but much more success. As far as hard working people go, I am not an all-day -  all-nighter. I do enjoy both physical and mental challenges and it seems that I also like to take on more work/play than I have time for. 
When I think back a bit, it wasn't luck that the Barn foundation happened to be finished the day before we brought 1000 bales of hay into it. It wasn't luck that I finished my Microsoft Server certification and landed a job with an IT firm in Markham. It wasn't luck that LivingRoom Experience asked me to be a member of their band. 
It was luck when it didn't rain on my hay after baling it, but it wasn't luck that we frantically loaded it all onto trucks and trailers and drove it under cover - avoiding the rain.
Hard work brings success, luck is just part of life.
I have heard some say  'I was lucky to be in the right place at the right time'. There are elements of truth there. But if you didn't get off your ass to be at the right place at the right time and have the 'right stuff' (which takes work) - you would have been 'Out Of Luck' !
Luck can smack you in the soft cheeks sometimes without you realizing it. In that case, it takes work to realize when a lucky opportunity presents itself (and therefore is no longer luck).
After that philosophical hogwash - its time for a glass of wine and a nap.

"Luck is a tag given by the mediocre to account for the accomplishments of genius."
~ Robert Heinlein