My belated inaugural 2024 post is finally here, and I want to take some time to provide a guide on drum roll notation, which can come in a few different, often unclear forms. Most importantly for me, I’ll explain how to cobble this all together for the drum set. So let’s get rolling. Heh.

Tremolo Slashes

Tremolo slashes have long been used to notate the three major types of drum rolls: the closed buzz roll (a.k.a. the multiple bounce roll or press roll), the open double stroke roll (historically known also as the two-beat roll or rudimental/military-style roll), and the single stroke roll. The exact drum roll that’s being called for typically depends on the exact drum and the situation. 

For concert snare drumming, tremolos almost always suggest a buzz roll. The number of slashes may vary, but this typically doesn’t affect how the roll is played; more important information can be found in the exact length of the roll and any articulation marks that may be involved. A short buzz is likely to be notated as an 8th note with a staccato dot and perhaps one slash, but the same buzz could very well be written with three slashes instead of one, and would more or less sound the same.

Here’s a relevant excerpt from Portraits in Rhythm, № 27:

When comparing the first two bars, it might seem a little odd that the shorter staccato rolls have more tremolo slashes — my interpretation is that the staccato rolls are meant to have both a short but dense character, while the rolls in the first measure have a smoother texture, as continuous with the 16th note singles as possible.

In orchestral percussion, most other instruments aside from the snare drum use tremolos to notate a single-stroke roll. This includes tympani, bass drum, suspended cymbal, and mallet percussion. Again, the number of slashes may vary, but this is more of an engraving decision. Much like the buzz roll, the number of notes and the subdivisions are not specified; how you play it usually comes down to things like tempo, the particular drum, and dynamics.  

Things like tambourines and triangles will also commonly use tremolos for their respective rolls, which aren’t really rudiments or even drum rolls, but rather special techniques that are beyond the scope of this post.  

When it comes to the world of rudimental drumming and drumline playing, tremolo slashes always notate double-stroke rolls, as well as open drags (which are confusingly called “diddles” by many; a topic for another time, perhaps). There’s a rule of thumb that says each slash of the tremolo instructs you as to how to subdivide. A quarter note with three slashes through the stem would be subdivided three times: 

Now, this isn’t a hard and fast rule. For instance, half notes may only be written with three slashes, but the likely interpretation is to play a drum roll as 32nd note doubles, which apparently requires four slashes. Tremolos with four slashes do exist, but are not common, and I don’t often see the “proper” style where a half note has four slashes.

In that same vein, whole note rolls meant to be played as 32nd note doubles are usually only written with three slashes, even though there should be five (I don’t think I’ve ever seen more than four slashes, and while examples might be out there, scorewriters like MuseScore don’t even have the option to do more than four).

Dotted notes present a similar quandary. A dotted 8th note with tremolo slashes almost certainly does not instruct you to subdivide a drum roll with dotted 16ths or 32nds. You should still subdivide down to 32nd notes, but play the number of normal 32nd note doubles that fit into three 8th notes (six):

Because of this ambiguity, I think the best way to write a double-stroke roll is to use whatever subdivision requires one slash on each note, if you have the space for it. In cut time, 8th notes may be written with a single slash to be played as 16th note doubles, which is acceptable given the oddities of cut time. I do not approve of writing 8th notes with two slashes each as a way of notating a 32nd note long roll. It’s tolerable (although not ideal) when done to write a five-stroke roll, but this is gross:

I have to warn you that you might see some wacky stuff when going through snare drum books, such as GL Stone’s book Accents and Rebounds:

Neither one of those approaches is common in the wild; what you see in Accents and Rebounds seems to be based on older notation shorthand where a single slash is written through a stem combined with multiple staccato dots, one for each intended degree of subdivision.

It’s a historic thing that has fallen out of favor, which is probably for the best — it always seems to confuse, not just for drum rolls but many other instruments, and I often see people asking about it online. It would never be used extensively in a rudimental setting unless someone is desperate for space. By modern standards, just the tremolo slash is fine.

Meanwhile, the tenuto marks are not typically a part of modern roll notation, even though drum rolls are the only way percussionists can play long tones. Tenutos are only common in drum corps writing, where they notate a mild accent (i.e., a tenuto is a bit louder, a standard accent is louder, and a “marcato” accent is much louder).

Other Drum Roll Styles

For modern drumline playing, buzzed drum rolls are now delineated with a “Z” running through the stem. This is a fairly recent innovation — it may have been used in drum corps as far back as the mid-70s, and Modern Drummer in April of 1977 credits a similar convention to a James Moore, but this style was not well-known until the Percussive Arts Society published the list of 40 rudiments in 1986.

(In case you were wondering, NARD did not include the buzz roll on the earlier rudiment list, and to my knowledge, never came up with a unique way of notating it. I don’t believe the famous NARD “green book” of drum solos has a single buzz roll, as buzzes were long thought not to be part of the rudimental style.)

While it’s new, the Z has become quite common in mainstream published drumline music, and I use it myself — I think it’s a great tool. However, I’m not aware of any composer in the last 50 years who has used a Z for buzz rolls in a symphony setting. Despite being ostensibly obsolescent, tremolo slashes are still the standard for all concert band drum rolls.

It’s also worth mentioning trill and mordent notation, which are occasionally used for buzz rolls on the snare drum. I’ve also seen them for tympani and bass drum, which is a bit more unusual. It’s still likely that you should play whatever roll is most appropriate, but if you see both tremolos and trills in the same score, consult your director/conductor. While it’s extremely unlikely that you would play something other than a single stroke roll… you never know.

I have seen some drumline music featuring trills as buzz rolls, but it’s not common; it seems to have been used to notate buzz rolls before the Z became a thing. Buzz rolls in general are not often played in a drumline — it wasn’t until about 50 years ago that percussive talking heads began to consider the buzz roll to even be a rudiment, so figuring out how to write both open and closed rolls in the same score had never been a big problem until more recently.

Concert snare drumming seems to present the opposite problem: is there a way to specify open doubles on a drum that doesn’t normally play them? I’m not aware of any, as any kind of roll written for concert snare drum should be presumed to be closed. Even writing out 16ths with one tremolo slash apiece is used for short buzz rolls.

If the score says “march” somewhere, then the composer might be steering you towards open rolls, but this is still worth discussing with your director.

A Word on Ties

Revisiting old snare drum books, here’s something from Stick Control:

These two exercises highlight the enduring confusion ties can cause with buzz rolls, given their indeterminate pulsation. The common conclusion is that no tie suggests putting a little more space between the roll and the following notes, while ties imply a more continuous timbre. Here’s an approximate visualization:

However, ties (or slurs, depending on how you think of them) cannot reliably inform you about the exact pulsation, i.e., seven buzzed strokes vs. nine. With a slow enough tempo, neither seven nor nine strokes is enough to make a long tone over a half note. If the tempo is much faster, then you might not be able to play more than four. As such, it’s generally not a good idea to try to infer how many buzzed strokes the score is telling you to play; instead, focus on the length of the notes.

Ties for open rolls don’t seem to be commonplace in modern drum corps engraving, and I don’t think they are necessary since these rolls are in strict time. People who spend too much energy staring at the rudiment sheet will insist on using ties, but in a drumline context, these are all going to sound the same:

Gratuitous Grace Notes

It seems prudent to devote a section to how grace notes are abused in older rudiment books, particularly the Charley Wilcoxon books. Here are the first three lines of solo № 128 from The All American Drummer:

The grace notes on the first line are meant to communicate a tap roll, so the very first note should really be an accented 16th. The eleven-stroke roll is weirder still — the grace notes are just there to tell you to play more notes than would normally fit on a quarter note. The most popular interpretation is to use a quintuplet, but in other books, the roll would start a 16th note early.

The ten-stroke rolls are the most ridiculous, as you need to transform the rhythms into something triplet-based. The only important part is to start the rolls on the quarter note. Here’s the excerpt written more properly, with the eleven interpreted two ways:

If you’re a non-percussionist reading this, wondering how to best write whatever drum roll you need, never, ever use grace notes like this. It is a complete ocular assault, and it’s profoundly disturbing that anybody once thought this was acceptable.*

Putting it Together for Drum Rolls on the Kit

Since the drum set uses all three drum rolls, how do we clarify which roll is meant to be played? Well, I use both tremolos and the Z, and again, it all comes down to the exact drum. 

I will only notate buzz strokes with the Z, but as always, the tremolo is open to some interpretation. When written on the snare drum, it always means an open double, but for toms and cymbals, I can use tremolos for both singles and doubles.

I’ve thus far only used tremolos on toms for trashcan endings where things are ad-libbed and perhaps rubato, such as the ending of “How Many More Times”:

Drags and double stroke rolls aren’t often played on toms since it doesn’t really sound right (unless your toms are cranked), but cymbals can use both singles and doubles.

Again, subdivisions can help. 16ths with one slash apiece would imply doubles on any cymbal or even tom, but three slashes on a longer subdivision would likely mean singles.

Some people use tremolos as a sort of shorthand for discrete singles (to save space more than anything else), but I always write out every note of a drum fill that’s in time.

* ^ You can browse the “Wilcoxon” tag over at Todd Bishop’s site if you want to see more examples of just how bad this can get.