PAS #24 · Flam rudiments
Flam Paradiddle
8 main strokes, 2 grace notes over 2 beats. Read it, hear it, and slow it down until it is even.
lRLRR rLRLL
Capital letters are full strokes; small letters are the quiet grace notes of a flam or drag.
What the flam paradiddle is
A single paradiddle with a flam on its first note, often called a flamadiddle. The flam thickens the accent that already starts each group.
How to practice it
- Learn the single paradiddle first; the flam only goes on the first note of each group.
- Keep the grace note low and close so it does not flam on the diddle by accident.
- Listen for a clean "flam" sound, not two separate hits — the grace note should almost touch the main one.
Where it leads
The flam paradiddle belongs to the flam rudiments family, and it feeds directly into the flam paradiddle-diddle and the single flammed mill. Get it even at a slow tempo before you move on — every rudiment built on top of it inherits whatever unevenness you leave here.
Reading the notation above
Both hands play the snare drum, so every notehead sits in the third space of the staff and the sticking letters underneath tell you which hand plays which note. Capital letters are full strokes; small letters are grace notes. The small noteheads with a slash through the stem are the grace notes of the ornament — they are played almost simultaneously with the note that follows, not as separate beats. The marks above the staff are accents: hit those notes harder. Full details in the drum notation guide.
Rudiment data last updated . Every diagram here, in the printable PDF and in the chart image comes from one dataset, so the paper and the screen cannot disagree.