Semiquaver's
Semiquavers (also called sixteenth notes) are notes that divide a single beat into four equal parts, so you play four evenly spaced hits for every beat of the pulse. When you count them, you can say "1 e & a, 2 e & a," which helps keep the spacing consistent.
Semiquaver/Crotchet Reading
Semiquavers next to plain crotchets — nothing combined yet, just getting your eye and your hands used to four-in-a-beat sitting next to one-per-beat.
Semiquaver/Quaver Reading
Now semiquavers mix with quaver pairs, so a beat might split into two even halves or four even quarters — and sometimes both inside the same bar. Every beat stays whole, though: no beat is ever split between a quaver and a pair of semiquavers. Read it slowly before trying it at tempo.
Basic Fills
A fill breaks up the groove for a bar (or part of one) before landing back on the beat. These four-note semiquaver fills move down from snare to the toms — start slow enough that every note stays even.
Song 2
A four-bar arrangement built on the ride cymbal instead of the hi-hat — a crash to open it, three bars of the same groove, then a tom fill for an ending. Play it start to finish.
Half Bar Fills
A two-bar phrase: play the groove for the first bar, then fill over beats 3 and 4 of the second. Shorter fills like this are what you'll use most often in a real song.
One Beat Fills
An even shorter fill — just the last beat of the bar. Three beats of groove, then one beat to say something different before the pattern repeats.
Subdivision Ladder
One exercise, four bars, one voice (the snare). The note density climbs a rung a bar — one note per beat, then two, then four — and the fourth bar starts back down, so leaving it looping walks you up and down the ladder without stopping.
Repeat each bar on its own several times until it feels secure before letting the whole thing run. The beat never changes; only how many notes you fit inside it does.
Open Hi-Hat Study
The circled note is an open hi-hat — let the cymbals ring instead of clamping them shut — before closing it again on the next hit. It's a small detail that changes the whole feel of a groove.
Song 3
Everything from this chapter in one arrangement: an open hi-hat groove that builds into a fill, then a ride-cymbal section with a crash pickup, ending on a tom fill. Play it start to finish.