Flam Accent

Learn How To Play The Flam Accent Drum Rudiment!

The next flam based drum rudiment we’ll be taking a look at is the flam accent. In this free drum lesson, Lionel Duperron guides you every step of the way while you learn how to execute the flam accent accurately on a single surface. He then goes to the drum set to show you how to apply the flam accent to drum fills and drum beats.

In the flam tap we had a double stroke roll played as 8th notes, where the first note was flammed. With the flam accent we have an 8th note triplet single stroke roll, where the first note is flammed. Thus, you need to have a good grasp on how to play the flam and the single stroke roll, before you can start thinking of mastering the flam accent. Taking a look at the sheet music below, you can see that after each flam there are two taps, and that the flam accent alternates within itself.

The first exercise on this free drum lesson teaches you how to incorporate the flam accent into a triplet based drum beat. The flam accent is mainly played on the hi-hat. The only exceptions here are on counts 2 and 4, where the flam is on the snare drum instead. The bass drum pattern is kept simple, being played on counts 1 and 3. Once you’ve mastered this exercise experiment adding different foot patterns to further challenge you.

The second drum beat is based on the previous one. Instead of having the flam accent played mainly on the hi-hat, Lionel decided to scatter the sticking pattern between the hi-hat and the bow of the ride cymbal. The snare drum is incorporated into the hi-hat and ride combination on counts 2 and 4, with flammed snare shots.

Exercise #3 teaches you how to play a drum fill in 12/8 time signature that incorporates the flam accent. The fill pattern is pretty straight forward – one flam accent for each drum. Lionel plays this drum fill leading with his left hand, which can bring about some issues when going from the hi-tom to the mid-tom. You’ll have to move the right hand out of the way after playing the “let” of count 2, so that you don’t end up clicking your sticks or hitting your right hand. Having that been said, you can play this fill with either right or left hand leading.

You can start by playing a 8th note triplet single stroke roll around the drums instead of flam accents, just to get used to playing a triplet based drum fill. When you feel comfortable with that pattern, add the flams where notated. Remember that you’ll be starting any count on each drum with a different hand leading. If you’re only used to playing 16th note or 8th note fills around the drums, this can cause you some predicaments. To work around this, practice this drum fill at a slower speed. This will enable you to get used to the change in leading hand with greater ease.

The next exercise is the last in this free drum lesson. The flam accent is played between the floor tom and the snare drum in a 12/8 time signature drum fill. The whole pattern is performed with the right hand playing all of its flam accent strokes on the floor tom, and the left hand doing the same but on the snare drum. Thus, expect to have your flams broken between these two drums. This is another cool way of changing things around a bit. Breaking the flams around different surfaces really adds a lot to any pattern.

Going from the last hi-hat note on the stock 12/8 drum beat to playing a flam with the grace note on the floor tom can be a bit of a stretch. Make sure you practice this beat-fill transition really slow at first, making sure the grace note on the flam is played exactly like it should.

Once you’re mastered the flam accent, you can move on to learn new flam based drum rudiments. If you haven’t learned how to play the flam tap then go check it out. If you’ve already learned how to play the flam tap, check the Swiss army triplet, the flamacue, and the flam drag drum rudiments.

Flam Based Rudiments
Flam	Flam Paradiddle	Inverted Flam Tap
Flam Tap	Single Flammed Mill	Flam Drag
Flam Accent	Flam Paradiddle-diddle	Pataflafla
Flamacue	Swiss Army Triplet