Linear Time Playing: Drumset Book & Online Audio

Linear time playing is one of the most musically rewarding yet technically demanding skills a drummer can develop, and Chaffee's method presents it in digestible stages. The book earns its place in your percussion curriculum because it separates the mechanical work (voice coordination, dynamic control) from the expressive work (applying linear concepts to actual time feels), letting students build confidence before they're asked to swing or navigate odd meters.

Methodical and rewarding. The progression from isolated mechanical drills to fully realized grooves mirrors the satisfaction of learning any complex skill, and linear playing rewards your discipline with a unique voice that sits distinctly between jazz and modern styles.

Intermediate to advanced high school drummers and college-level students ready to expand beyond traditional swing or straight-eighth vocabularies. This book assumes solid single-stroke roll technique and comfortable independence; it's designed for players seeking a systematic foundation in a style that's increasingly common in contemporary music.

• Start with hand-feet independence exercises at a tempo where you can hear all four limbs clearly; rushing through at performance speed masks coordination problems that will resurface later.
• Record yourself during the time-feel section and listen back for evenness in the linear lines; your ears will catch subtle timing drift that feels fine in the moment.
• When working through the shuffles and half-time feels, isolate just two voices at a time before combining all four, especially in odd meters where the brain has less natural anchor points.
• Use the online audio to check your phrasing and swing feel; the recorded models show how linear playing should breathe musically, not just sit mechanically.

Assign this to your serious jazz or contemporary ensemble drummers as a summer or semester-long deep dive. The 72 pages work well as supplemental material for a drummer preparing for college auditions, and the odd-meter section pairs naturally with any contemporary classical percussion repertoire you might be programming.

• Four-way coordination with emphasis on linear voice independence
• Dynamic balance across all four limbs
• Accenting within flowing linear patterns
• Half-time and shuffle feels from a linear perspective
• Odd-meter time feels (beyond 4/4) using linear principles
• Reading and executing linear notation accurately