Chops for the Modern Drummer, by Matt Bover, explores new and different ways of thinking about “chops” for drummers. This book, which features an easy-to-understand non-traditional notation system, features fundamentals, triplet patterns (in groups of 6, 9, 12), odd patterns (5, 7, 10, 11, 14), binary, or duple, patterns, and a section dedicated to creating new, creative chops with rudiments.
A chop is a musical event where a musician expresses themselves through their musical knowledge and vocabulary. Given the context, it can either be a very short word (for example a single pattern played over the span of a beat) or can be a sentence/paragraph (multiple patterns over the span of a bar or longer).
About Matt Bover
Matt Bover is originally from the Woodstock, NY area. Immediately after high school Matt moved to Barcelona, Spain to study jazz and latin styles at an internationally recognized music conservatory. At Barcelona’s Conservatori del Liceu, Matt not only maintained straight A’s while practicing 15 hours a day and a full class schedule, he was able to meet thousands of new people and musicians every week from every part of the planet. During this time Matt played with many artists all around Europe. Later, Matt returned to the United States and moved to Boston, Massachusetts. Matt continued his studies with Berklee and the college awarded him a full performance scholarship to the school. Since moving to Boston, Matt has played, performed and recorded with some of Berklee’s best. One of Matt’s biggest passions is teaching and sharing his knowledge as much he can. He currently spends the majority of his time teaching, gigging and performing clinics.