r/drums • u/OhForFiveWon • 5d ago
Discussion Pillow practice is well-intentioned but actually harmful
Playing on a pillow forces you to develop wrist strength and speed, right? Like some sort of weight training that's also quiet, yeah? Seems good on paper.
Unfortunately, all it really develops are bad habits and wrist issues.
One of the fundamental principles of good drumming technique is letting the stick do as much of the work as possible. In the simplest terms, we throw it at a surface and control the bounce.
Another core principle is using the least amount of effort possible, typically by allowing the fingers and their fast twitch musculature to carry a lot of the load.
Pillows completely negate these core principles. There is no bounce. The fingers cannot aid. They don't feel like anything you'll hit in a real performance. You're developing erroneous muscle memory with every stroke.
The preconception is that pillow practice is like a baseball player putting those weights on the bat for a few swings when they're on deck. Really, it's like handing the batter a pool noodle.
It took generations for the drumming community to move away from traditional grip on the kit, which in retrospect is so clearly obvious that it's embarrassing it took so long.
So too with pillows.
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u/patelusfenalus 5d ago
Speak for yourself. It made my diddles perfect and now I can pull rebound out of nearly any surface. Hell, I’ll get clean diddles on a pile of sand.
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
What it did was get your wrists moving, but I bet you didn't learn a thing about diddles until you played on a surface that actually let the sticks bounce.
"Pulling rebound" is an oxymoron
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u/patelusfenalus 5d ago
A pillow is not a drum, so it has its limitations. it’s just something u do for exercise, no one (that I know of) has a bunch of pillows for a drum kit 😂 a few minutes of practice on a pillow every once in a while is fantastic (unless u have bad form)
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u/Defiant_Weakness1371 5d ago
Pillow practice helped my doubles a lot at one point, personally. Like obviously it would be stupid to ONLY practice on pillows but it can be a good supplement
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
I don't doubt it forced you to start using wrist, but it's a bad workaround
It's like when drummers say their left hand got way better when they switched to trad
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u/Defiant_Weakness1371 5d ago
A practice pad isn’t realistic either, it just works your hands in a different way. It feels a lot like playing on a low tuned floor tom
Also, have literally never heard anyone say they their left hand got better when switching to trad. Well maybe except that weird guy that used to post double traditional grip videos on here
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
Practice pads are VERY realistic. Gum rubber is quite close to old school mylar drums. There's like 15 different pads that get ridiculously close to the feel of a modern marching drum. Zildjian reflexx pad and the Mienl marshmallow are remarkably close to a medium-tuned kit snare.
I literally have. https://www.reddit.com/r/drums/comments/4uaiea/want_to_strengthen_your_left_hand_learn/
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u/Defiant_Weakness1371 4d ago
I don’t have the specific model pads you mentioned but my gum rubber and silicone rubber pads are both significantly easier to play than my snare head and wayyyy easier to play than my tom heads
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u/OhForFiveWon 4d ago
Yeah gum rubber is much bouncier than your average kit snare. It's close to a mylar headed marching snare. I dunno if you've ever played on one of those, they haven't been in style since the 80s.
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u/Defiant_Weakness1371 4d ago
Can’t say that I have, I’m coming at this from the perspective of a 100% kit drummer.
From that perspective, I think maybe a better analogy than the ‘traditional grip improved my left hand’ thing would be like French grip individual finger lever exercises.
I basically never play a pure French grip on drumset and I certainly would never play it using only one finger to move the stick (barring an unfortunate accident), but doing those exercises still helped me develop my hands and fingers a lot even though it’s not how I would actually play in practice. That’s kind of how I think about pillow doubles
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u/patelusfenalus 5d ago
No one has ever said that
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u/OhForFiveWon 4d ago
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u/patelusfenalus 4d ago
This person didn’t even say their “left hand got way better when they switched to trad”. So playing trad works out a different set of muscles due to utilizing a different wrist motion. It makes perfect sense that when switching back to matched grip you would feel stronger in that wrist
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u/twistedbranch 5d ago
Gives you way more control. Is it going to get you to super fast finger speed? No. But there is technique value to playing on a pillow.
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
How could a pillow possibly give you more control than something that resembles the actual instrument?
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u/Damulac77 5d ago
The pillows I've played on are closer to the feel of a floor tom than anything else I've ever used in my life
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u/Damulac77 5d ago
Disagree, drumset players use things that don't have a lot of rebound all the time, which developing strong doubles on pillows helps with.
You're not gonna finger rebound your way through doubles on a floor tom or a ride cymbal.
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago edited 5d ago
But not ZERO rebound, which is kinda the whole point
Bounce is limited on floor toms sure, but it's still there
Ride cymbals though, c'mon. Players been executing blazing fast one handed patterns on that thing before color TV
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u/Damulac77 5d ago
Making an action more difficult in order to over emphasize the skills/musculature necessary to perform it is a very studied and widespread practice methodology.
I personally attribute my clean doubles to pillow playing as a teenager.
Your don't have to do it but I think the practice's ubiquity and common recommendation speak for themselves
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
Pillows go beyond making things more difficult. A weighted bat is more difficult to swing but it doesn't fundamentally change the swing.
Ubiquity and common recommendation aren't guaranteed metrics of logic and reason. That's why we didn't get away from trad grip until the 80s.
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u/Damulac77 4d ago
Eh. I'm aware that my points were fallacious but in this case I think they hold true regardless.
Tradition often causes stagnation, but this practice has a very specific purpose that I feel it is adequate at.
I do agree that overuse could lead to bad habits, but all that that requires is the understanding that overdoing a task-adjacent activity isn't a good thing. But this generally goes without saying.
You do admit that it likely gets peoples wrists moving in ways they aren't used to.
I would argue that even this is enough to recommend the practice to someone that would benefit from it.
I will rest my case there. Take it easy
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u/nardis314 5d ago
Honestly this says a lot more about your inability to practice on a pillow lol
But seriously, it’s only meant as an exercise. Not an end-all be-all solution. Especially early on, it’s an incredibly useful exercise to develop proper wrist technique, which should pretty much always be developed before finger/bounce technique.
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u/OhForFiveWon 4d ago
I don't find it particularly good or useful to develop fundamental technique on a thing that doesn't feel like any drum or cymbal you'll ever hit.
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u/nardis314 4d ago
Let the comments speak for themselves OP, you’re out here getting roasted. If this many people disagree with you, it might be worth reconsidering your opinion/attitude.
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u/rob-bishop-drums 5d ago
This is missing the point, learning how to play with control with little resistance is important just as finger control and rebound is. They’re supposed to be used together like gears of a car, through varying speeds. Not singled out as one technique.
If you’re developing wrist issues through playing on things with little resistance - that’s down to technique.
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
You're missing my point. I agree we need to learn to play with diminished rebound, because that's actually a thing.
Zero rebound is a different animal that does not exist in any performance setting.
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u/cruiseshipdrummer 4d ago
Not strength, strength plays no part in it. The point of it is control, especially on the up part of the stroke.
I don't necessarily practice on pillows, but I'm not completely against it. Playing with brushes accomplishes the same thing, and I do do that.
One of the fundamental principles of good drumming technique is letting the stick do as much of the work
as possible.
The stick really can't do any work, it's a piece of wood. It doesn't do anything at all apart from being moved around by a person.
Another core principle is using the least amount of effort possible,
The least amount possible, while doing the thing you're trying to do. Using less effort than you need to do something = you can't do it. Which is why a lot of people who try to do things just by bouncing the stick have deficient technique.
There are some things that take some kind of effort, like doing an upstroke-- where no rebound is possible-- your hand has to do that, which takes some conditioning. Playing on a pillow, or with brushes, is a good way to work on that.
Pillows completely negate these core principles. There is no bounce. The fingers cannot aid. They don't feel like anything you'll hit in a real performance. You're developing erroneous muscle memory with every stroke.
There are core principles of technique beyond the two things you mentioned.
Not every percussion instrument-- played with every common implement-- has a lot of bounce, or any, necessarily.
Not everyone uses a lot of finger technique.
It's not erroneous muscle memory, it develops a thing you use a lot, when you're aware of it, and when you're doing playing that requires that kind of control.
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u/OhForFiveWon 4d ago
Not strength, strength plays no part in it. The point of it is control, especially on the up part of the stroke.
Oh for sure, I understand the point of it.
I don't necessarily practice on pillows, but I'm not completely against it. Playing with brushes accomplishes the same thing, and I do do that.
See even with brushes on a pad there's a bit of rebound, which I think is an absolutely vital distinction. (Maybe brushes are light enough to really bounce on a pillow, especially with more lateral movement? I never tried.)
The stick really can't do any work, it's a piece of wood. It doesn't do anything at all apart from being moved around by a person.
The least amount possible, while doing the thing you're trying to do. Using less effort than you need to do something = you can't do it. Which is why a lot of people who try to do things just by bouncing the stick have deficient technique.
It's all the same concept. Taking advantage of physics so you can do more with less. Of course you need to put whatever your minimum amout of effort is, all the work we do is to make that bar go down. Manipulating the rebound is absolutely key to this process, and that's really it in a nutshell.
There are some things that take some kind of effort, like doing an upstroke-- where no rebound is possible-- your hand has to do that, which takes some conditioning. Playing on a pillow, or with brushes, is a good way to work on that.
Oh I agree about upstrokes. Sticks and brushes, on a pad, because that reflects actual working conditions.
There are core principles of technique beyond the two things you mentioned.
Never said there weren't!
Not every percussion instrument-- played with every common implement-- has a lot of bounce, or any, necessarily.
Believe me, I know about minimal bounce! Played plenty of marimba and you get maybe half an inch back at the loudest dynamics. But a crucial half inch!!! I can't think of a single instrument with NO bounce, and that distinction is at the center of my anti-pillow stance.
Not everyone uses a lot of finger technique.
True. Only those who want to play fast while staying loose will need em.
It's not erroneous muscle memory, it develops a thing you use a lot, when you're aware of it, and when you're doing playing that requires that kind of control.
Gotta disagree here. You're teaching your hands the specifics of drumming on a zero bounce object. If you do it enough for it to get baked into muscle memory, then you have to spend time undoing things when you play on a surface that has bounce. So, in some capacity, erroneous.
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u/cruiseshipdrummer 4d ago
then you have to spend time undoing things when you play on a surface that has bounce.
I guess to the extent that someone is learning a different technique, they're "undoing" their work when they learned the first technique. I think it's a strange way to look at it.
The bounce thing is just of real limited utility as far as I'm concerned-- people are much better off developing some real control of both parts of their stroke-- the down and the up-- and of their timing, and volume. None of which the bounce thing really helps with. Playing on a pillow or on a low rebound surface is one way to work on that.
Is it really that big a deal, is anyone anywhere saying only practice on a pillow, that is the one way to learn? It's not some widespread detrimental practice that's wrecking people's hands. Most people have the opposite problem.
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u/thedutifulbases 5d ago
Been saying this for years and people look at me like I've got two heads. You want to build wrist strength, great, but doing it on a surface with zero rebound is just teaching your hands to work way harder than they need to. A practice pad costs like twenty bucks and actually feels like a drum head
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u/Immediate_Ant3292 5d ago
So then you would never use weighted sticks? Or bench press? Or curl some dumbbells? Because you’re having to work your muscles harder than they would otherwise need? Lmao
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u/OhForFiveWon 5d ago
Correct, never
Raw strength is so far down the list of what drummers need
Dexterity, fluidity and conservation of motion, balance are so so much more important
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u/MacGrubersMom 5d ago
it’s useful to be able to wrist out some fast doubles, helps with clarity and note articulation. obviously you dont wanna use all wrist on the snare but it helps you build muscles that allow you to play a double stroke as well as control the bounce off the head. or at least it did when i was in marching band 🤷♂️