The six-stroke roll is six notes — R L L R R L — with accents on the R's at positions 1 and 4. Played as 8th-note triplets, it covers two beats per repetition and feels like two waves cresting.
Once it's in your hands, it unlocks a huge amount of fusion vocabulary. The basic pattern stays on the snare; the variations move the LL groups around the toms, add the bass drum on the final L, and end on a crash. Vinnie Colaiuta and Dave Weckl live inside this phrase.
Exercises
2A — Six-Stroke on Snare (8th-note triplets)
Two reps of RLLRRL per bar — four triplet groups total. Sticking: R L L R R L · R L L R R L. Accents on positions 1 and 4 only.
2B — Six-Stroke Around the Kit
The kit application: accents move to the toms (high tom on 1, floor tom on 4) while the taps stay home on the snare. Keep the wrists low for taps — only the accent arm travels. The kick quarters anchor the pulse so the phrase reads as a fill over time, not a free-fall.