Ok, a friend from the line was telling me yesterday that he started to practice 3-way back sticking the other day since he saw that instructing video from the VF site with Queen. Well, he's been working on it for about a week now he said and has noticed a fairly good improvement in his playing. Says that he thinks it got him a bit better because of the wrist movements that happen while doing the trick. Commennnts..

Yeah, stick twirling and backstickings do help from my experience. The stick toss where you toss a stick from your right hand to your left with a 180 degree spin on it and pass the stick from you left to your right turning it around 180 degrees also helped me loosen up and get better. Anything that makes you more comfortable with your sticks can help.

I think all visuals can help your playing quite a bit. Not as much as actually practicing, but they do help. It is mainly the sticking patterns you learn. eg. When you learn backsticking in a roll, you have learned the slurred five stroke roll.

yah that is true. i remember practicing 3-way backsticking and after a few days of learning the trick i relized that my playing did get better after all the wrist movement

Hmm...I should try that.

It's true !!!
I feel better since practicing it intensively

Does anyone know of any internet videos where they teach the correct way to do those tricks? I started expirementing last night but I want to make sure I have the technique correct.

http://www.vicfirth.com/artists/queen.html

Go down and look at the 3-way Video.

I'm not sure about 3way, but stick tricks in general do make you more comfortable with the sticks and therefore, you have a better "feel" for them. But yeah... a kid on my snareline has perfect 3 way... and he is absolutely horrible at anything else. His rolls are pulsating as well as just playing 16ths, and he has no technique whatsoever. Maybe we should just have him play 16th 3way check patterns throughout the show!

we have some people like that on our line. But thats ok. We just forced him to play quiet... doenst work all the good though.