Does anyone know of some "games" that I can play to practice 8 on a hand. The regular 8 on a hand is starting to get boring to play for hours. I want something that will workout my mind as well as my hands. I already know about Bill's Get Good Quick Plan but I want something else to play. Any little things you do to break the monotony of any exercise would be great. Thanks

play the same type of thing but start in 1/8 then go to 2/8, 3/8, 4/8, 5/8 maybe all the way up to 9 or 10 and them come back down. mark time while playing through all of them too.

as far as bill's little plan, listen to it, there really aren't any shortcuts to anything. as boring as it might be it is the most basic of things that you would want to work on. like math. you have go to know what 2+2 is in order to build off of it...............good luck

Try going through different metrics and time signatures and such. Play on 1 and & for a measure, then play on E and A the next. Play a beat or so of 8th notes, then 5's, and triplets, and change the metrics like that. Mark time to everything as well. Use 8ths to get right and left hand independance--play triplets on one hand, and 5s on the other. Or do something like that with your feet--mark time triplets or drag triplets and play 8ths or 16ths or something. Theres a lot you can do, just get creative!

Practicing to music is alwasy sweet...

Play 10's to the eight note quintuplet.
...or 12's to the sexlet, or 14's to the septuplet, etc.

Seriously. That'll boost up your timing hardcore if you do it right - especially the 5's and 7's because those aren't natural patterns.


Otherwise,
Play Glassmen Legatos, or Madison Eights, Colts Legato Combos, or about any other corps eights/legato exercise.
Crecendo, decrecendo, etc... (this especially helps when it comes to accent-tap because you already know the velocities needed to get a consistent quality of sound out of every stroke)
Sandwich in duple/triple modulations, etc etc...

Play 10-1-10. Start from 10 on a hand and subtract one every round until you get to 1, then go back up to 10. There's so much you can do with that exercise. Flam, crscendos, decrescendos. It also challenges the brain mildly.

Walk up to an unsuspecting person. Ask them for 6 numbers between 1 and 16(for a 2 measure exercise). These are the eighth notes that you add accents or flams are something to just to entertain yourself. Or you could try the above mentioned things.

An excercise called 8-7-6. It's 8s, thinking, and Taps and Accents all rolled into one. (At one level) 8 on the right, 8 on the left, 7 on the right, 7 on the left, 6 on the right, 6 on the left. That's the 8s part.

Then the Split Part is ( ^ = accent, - = tap)
|^ - - - ^ - - - |^ - - - ^ - - - | (This is the 8 bar)
|^ - ^ - - ^ - |^ - ^ - - ^ -| (This is the 7 bar)
|^ - - ^ - - |^ - - ^ - -| (This is the 6 bar)

So right after you play the stuff all at one height, do the Taps and Accents part with two other friends so you can split parts. Have one person play 8-7-6-7-6-8 which is the snare part. The second person play 8-7-6-6-8-7 which is the tenor part. And the last person plays 8-7-6-8-7-6 which is the bass part. It's pretty cool.
~Anthony

Or you could do a full diminution, doing two bars each of 8/8, 7/8, 6/8, 5/8, 4/8, 3/8, 2/8, and 1/8, accenting on the first and last eighth note of each bar, similar to a converse of Alex's idea.

our drum line use a warmup called lagatos, it starts w/ 16 on the right 16 on the left 16 on both then some 16th note paterns and its defatly more interesting if ur curious i can send u a copy, its not complicated at all.