Shuffled Drums Workout: Drumset Book & CD

Buhse doesn't isolate shuffle as a historical curiosity. He treats sixteenth-note and eighth-note shuffles as working tools your students will encounter in current music, from pop production to soul records. The progression from component parts (bass drum, snare, hi-hat, ghost notes) to full groove composition means students understand why a shuffle grooves, not just how to play one. The included jamtracks across multiple styles give real context for what they're learning.

Working through Shuffled Drums Workout feels like learning a grammar before writing sentences. Early chapters feel methodical, almost clinical, as you isolate kick and snare relationships. As you move into the groove chapters, that discipline pays off: suddenly you're composing variations, and the shuffle pocket becomes intuitive rather than mechanical. The jamtracks inject energy and purpose throughout, anchoring abstract rhythmic concepts to music that actually grooves.

Intermediate drummers ready to expand beyond standard rock and jazz feels into the shuffled grooves saturating contemporary music production. Players who want systematic training in how grooves are constructed, not just pattern memorization. Students interested in understanding why certain shuffles work in hip-hop, R&B, and current pop rather than treating them as stylistic anomalies.

• Start with the audio reference for each exercise before reading. Your ear absorbs the shuffle subdivision faster than your eyes can parse it on the page.
• Pay deliberate attention to ghost notes once you reach them. They're what separate a metronomic shuffle from a groove that breathes.
• Use the jamtracks in the style sections that don't immediately appeal to you. A funk interpretation teaches your hands things a straight blues shuffle won't.
• Build the grooves incrementally rather than jumping ahead. The book sequences exercises to lock each component before combining them.

Assign this systematically to any drummer whose comping or soloing needs to function in contemporary contexts. The 144-page scope works well as a semester-long supplementary project rather than primary method material. Include sections strategically in ensemble rehearsals when your repertoire features shuffled feels, so your drumming section works from shared vocabulary.

• Distinguishing and executing sixteenth-note shuffle vs. eighth-note shuffle subdivision
• Constructing kick and snare patterns over shuffle feels
• Integrating ghost notes and crash accents into groove language
• Reading and performing blues-based and contemporary shuffled grooves
• Creating original groove variations from component patterns
• Locking with jamtracks across funk, soul, R&B, and blues styles