Classic drummer joke:

What's the drummer say when you ask hime to play with more dynamics?

"I'm already playing as loud as I can!"

hahahaha

Anyway, I had some shows this weekend with an un-mic'ed chorus in a very "live" hall. Pretty much everything I played was too loud.

Loved it!

I really enjoy the challenge of playing softly. How do you get the instruments to speak with good tone when you're barely getting them vibrating? It's a great challenge. I'd much rather do that than try and force the drums to play louder. I ended up playing the whole show with timbale sticks - the small diameter kept the volume down, but they were dense enough to get a good attack. They also gave a good rim click snare sound, which was in every song. One song had 16ths on the hihat, so I switched to "rutes" for that one - I know I'd get overzealous once both hands get going, so I went ahead and sacrificed a little tone to keep myself out of trouble.

In the preface to Stone's "Stick Control", talking specifically about rolls, he mantions taht playing softly increases your control over the sticks, making it easier to play loud. I have to agree. If you can play with conviction under a solo voice, everything else is easy!

(then I went to salsa rehearsal and played loud enough to make my hands hurt - keep it full spectrum!)