Stutter
for solo snare drum
Price range: $14.00 through $19.00
Stutter by Keaton Jones is an advanced work for solo snare drum that uses a variety of techniques and irregular rhythmic groupings to produce various stutter effects. Additionally, it uses different types of standard and nonstandard multiple-bounce strokes with each hand to challenge the performer and encourage rudimental growth.
This piece ships as a fully bound score or as an instant PDF download for printing or tablet viewing.
- Concert snare drum
Reviews
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Stephen Busath –
Aptly titled, a good portion of this solo is made up of short repetitive rhythmic cells. If you are searching for a piece that has a particularly rhythmic challenge, I encourage looking into this. The rhythms at the given tempos make this quite difficult. It uses syncopations, time-signature changes, tempo changes, and a variety of five-note groupings to create this challenge.
From a technical standpoint the most difficult aspect of this composition is the deliberate stickings. In particular, the use of controlled rebound is quite advanced. There are many instances where the performer is expected to play four notes in a row rapidly with one hand. For example, measure 104 is made up of a crescendo of sextuplets at 170 bpm. Connecting the second and third beats are four repeating left hands and four repeating right hands. The piece also uses a variety of rudiments and hybrid rudiments including inverted flam tap, flam accent, flam cheese, single-stroke four, eggbeater (throughout), rudimental-style roll, and paradiddle-diddle to name a few. In the program notes the composer states the aspect of “rudimental growth” being important to this solo.
As mentioned, meter changes and tempo changes are written throughout this piece. A good amount of “Stutter” is in simple meters, but there is a notable section in 12/8 as well as a section that switches between several time signatures including 7/8, 5/8, and 3/8. The composer does well to reference rhythms from these time signatures later, even when in simple meter.
This is a great addition to the snare drum repertoire. It is not an easy feat to have a new take on a concert/rudimental snare drum solo without the use of many extended techniques or different implements. This work focuses on rhythm and sticking, which may not sound innovative, but the way in which it is done is quite creative.
—Stephen Busath
Percussive Notes
Vol. 63, No. 3, June 2025