Three ways to play 5s

I noticed last week that in the email version of the blog, the formatting that keeps the counts and the zil strikes lined up was lost. To see the lined up version of the below zil patterns from the emailed version of the blog, please click on the blog title in the email which will take you to the actual blog post.


Let’s take a look at 5s. In intermediate I teach what I call 5s, but should probably be more appropriately called syncopated 5s. Needless to say, this is not the only way to play 5s! Today we will look at some of the other options out there. If you are an intermediate student and still don’t have the 5s I teach in intermediate figured out, just concentrate on that version so as not to confuse yourself. If you can play syncopated 5s without problems, here are a couple other options for you to play around with.

Syncopated 5s
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 RLR L R RLR L R RLR L R RLR L R


Skipping 5s are similar to the way we play 7s, but since there are two few zil strikes, there is a longer pause between repetitions of the pattern.

Skipping 5s
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   RLRLR   RLRLR   RLRLR   RLRLR

Running 5s are also similar to how we play 7s. They are also basically the same as the skipping 5s are played except instead of maintaining a three quarter beat pause between repetitions, only a one quarter beat pause is used which means you will want to play running 5s for multiples of eight counts so that you transition to a new rhythm at a logical point.

Running 5s
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   RLRLR RLRLR RLRLR RLRLR RLRLR

Next week we will look at some of the ways we can combine 5s with other zil patterns.