The left foot, also known as the forgotten limb, is a limb many drummers don’t spend enough time practicing with. This results in poor left foot independence, limb interdependence, strength and control. It also hinders one’s ability to use it effectively as a time-keeper or when playing double bass. Being competent with only three of your four limbs limits your musical pallet and expressiveness. To help you start working on your left foot independence and increase your musicality, Jared Falk came up with this free drum lesson. Watching the video will have you learning all about the various hi-hat foot techniques as well as getting you access to five exercises for developing left foot independence.
Each exercise focus on one of five fundamental hi-hat foot patterns: quarter notes, 8th notes, off-beats, 8th note hi-hat splashing, and double strokes. It’s important you spend some time with each one before moving on to the next. Pick the exercise you’re most interested on or you feel is more adequate to your current level of expertise. Learn how to play it at various tempos and as notated in the PDF sheet music. Once you feel comfortable with it, take its hi-hat foot pattern and combine it with the other four exercises. This way, you’ll have five different exercises to work on left foot independence for each fundamental hi-hat pattern–cool way to get 15 new exercises too! As for the heel-toe technique Jared Falk mentions while explaining exercise five in the video, check this video for more details on it.
If you’d like to keep working on left foot independence, take the hi-hat foot patterns from this free drum lesson and combine them with exercises from any other lesson. Free drum lessons like “Beginner Tom-Tom Drum Beats” and “Intermediate Cross-Sticking” are great for doing that. Don’t forget to move the hi-hat strokes from the exercises in those lessons to the ride cymbal or any other sound source you like.
Besides left-foot independence issues, many drummers have a hard time playing different rhythms between their lead hand and foot. They usually end up playing the same rhythm with both, even with exercises where that isn’t called for. Jared knows as much about how frustrating this can be as how to overcome it. If you’re a beginner drummer facing this type of drum independence issue, check the free drum lesson “Beginner Independence“.
This free drum lesson is filled with great exercises for developing your weaker foot. If you’d like to work on your weaker hand as well, we encourage to take the exercises from the free drum lesson “Building The Weaker Hand” and incorporate them into your practice sessions.