Rudiments of The English March

Throughout the Warrant version of the English March, we see three distinct rudiments. Fisher’s version and the Douce MS’s version suggests that there are actually 5 rudiments.

Rudiments of the English March: Poung Stroke

To understand the English March, we must first define the term “Poung”.

In the Warrant’s notation, each final note is referred to as a “Poung” and notated with a fermata.

The Poung Stroke In Historic Manuals

A survey of eighteenth and nineteenth century drum manuals, shows that the word “poung” can have two related meanings:

• a hard, accented stroke
• a sharp stroke struck on the head near the hoops

The Douce MS uses the symbol ‘L’ in the same location as the Poung strokes in the Warrant and mostly matches where the Pong strokes appear in The Young Drummer’s Assistant.

Douce’s manuscript defines the ‘L’ as “a Bang by ye hoop” (qtd. in Byrne 53).

This largely corresponds to later manuals’ description of the rudiment.

• Lovering defines the poung stroke as a stroke near the hoop (9).
• Nevins explains that a Pong stroke is a sudden, hard, short beat (4).
• Ashworth and Klinehanse use the poung in a similar way as Nevins; unfortunately, neither provide a description themselves.
• Hazeltine and Howe have a more complicated description. A Pong stroke is a Flam played near the hoop, while simultaneously touching the hoop lightly (Hazletine 5; Howe 5).

Their description seems to mirror Arbeau’s instructions for the basic 5-beat rhythm of a marching cadence, in which the fifth and final stroke should be “with both sticks at once” (20).

The majority of American manuals, however, describe the pong stroke as a single stroke. While The Young Drummer’s Assistant doesn’t define a pong stroke, it does indicate that it’s always played by the right hand (2).

For this reason, it’s possible that the poung stroke in these 17^th century sources should be interpreted as a flam near the hoops.

THe Poung: Flam or Right-Hand Stroke?

Although it’s possible that the Poung should be a flam, I would suggest it’s more likely a right-hand stroke.

YDA’s description suggests that the Poung stroke must be performed with the right-hand only (2).

Issac Day’s drum manuscript (1797) indicates a fermata represents a poung stroke, but never uses one in his music. Though he doesn’t explain the symbol, Gardner’s manuscript (1788) also uses a fermata to end several lines. It appears at the end of “The First March”, as well as in “A Troop Short” and “A Troop Sh Long”, both of which beatings are very similar to The Troop in YDA in a position that YDA indicates should be a poung stroke. He also uses it in To Go for Wood, which according to von Steuben and later sources indicates it is a poung stroke. In all of these instances, the poung stroke is in the right-hand staff.

Lovering also uses a fermata to indicate a poing stroke. He notes that it should be made with only one hand, though not which one. When used in The General, the poing stroke is in the right-hand staff, while when used in Wood Call, it is on the left-hand staff.

Ashworth notes poung strokes as being both hands, but his use of the poung stroke seems to indicate accented notes and not the older poung stroke. Robbinson and Hazeltine both indicate that poung strokes are played as flams.

Although Lovering casts some doubt, overall early drum manuals seem to indicate that a poung stroke should always be a right-hand stroke. Even when performed as a flamed Poung stroke (seen in a number of beatings in YDA, such as Drummer’s Call), only the right hand is a poung, while the left hand appears to be a regular stroke.

Sound of a Poung Stroke

Whether played as a flam (as suggested by Arbeau, and Hazeltine and Howe) or a right-hand stroke, the poung stroke has a sound unique from a “plain” or regular stroke upon the center of the drum head.

A strike near the center of the drum head creates a sharp, snapping sound, engaging the snares fully. A strike near the hoops has very little snare, but a lot of reverberation. It literally sounds like a “poing” or “poung”.

This distinction in sound is only produced when playing on a drum with calf skin heads and no cloth muffler placed under the head. The cloth muffler (whether on synthetic or natural heads) dampens the reverberation that helps to create a distinct and higher pitch sound for the poung stroke.

Presumably the Poung fulfills the intention of Arbeau’s flam: it creates a distinct and audible end to the phrase. Moreover, the slight rest after the poung allows the reverberation to carry through the rest, preventing complete silence. 

This definition tells us how all of the rhythms in the English March end.

---

Rudiments of the English March: Half and Whole Ruffe

Once we have the basic rhythm established, we can explore the other divisions. As explained earlier, the other divisions appear to be embellishments on Division 2. Each one simple adds Half Ruffes and Whole Ruffes.

Divisions 3, 4, 5, and 7: R, or the Whole Ruffe

Divisions 3, 4, 5, and 7 are identical in rhythm to Division 2. Except they increasingly use a rudiment notated as ‘R’ in the Warrant, ‘Rou’ by Holme, ‘whole Ruffe’ by the Douce manuscript, or ‘full Ruffe’ by Fisher.

To produce a translation of these next four divisions, we must consider two things:

• What rudiment or sticking pattern is intended by the term ‘R’?
• How do we correctly incorporate this rudiment into the rhythm established by Division 2?

‘R’ Indicates a 5-Stroke Roll

The obvious answer tells us that ‘R’ stands for ‘roll’.

Even if that assumption is correct, it doesn’t tell us what kind of roll to perform. For that, we turn to the Douce’s manuscript, Fisher’s version, and The Young Drummer’s Assistant.

YDA appears to confirm the suspicion that the ‘R’ represents a roll by its use of a “Roll continued” in the position corresponding to every ‘R’ under a minim.

In Fisher’s descriptions, we see that the ‘R’ in The Warrant corresponds to his ‘full ruffe’. This also matches the use of ‘O’, or a complete circle, depicted in the Douce manuscript, called a ‘whole Ruffe’.

Whereas Fisher’s music assumes a certain familiarity with the terminology, Douce’s manuscript explains that a “whole Ruffe […] is 5 stroaks ending hard”. Based on this description, we can make two assumptions:

5-Stroke Roll in Other Nations

The 5-stroke roll is a universal roll in 18^th and 19^th century English and American drum tutors. It is also featured in the English Reveille and The Points of War. Often known as the ‘mother’, the 5-stroke roll plays a prominent role in the English style of drumming.

Additionally, although they don’t appear in any of the 1754 French duty beatings, 5-stroke rolls are one of the earliest named rolls in the 1833 French ordinances. They are also featured in the French Reveille and are frequently employed in French marches.

Modern German snare drum manuals refer to the 5-stroke roll as the “Deutsche Ruf” and the 4-stroke roll as the “Franzosischer Ruf”. The terminology here suggests a connection between the old English “Ruffe” with the modern German “Ruf” or short roll. It would be interesting to see how old these terms are and what overlap between the older German and older English terminology exists.

See Kruger, Pauke und Kleine Trommel Schule, p. 164-5

For this reason, we should assume the whole ruffe is a 5-stroke roll.

Rhythm of the 5-Stroke Roll

If we agree that the whole ruffe represents a 5-stroke roll, we need to decide on the rhythm of the 5-stroke roll that best fits the base rhythm.

5-stroke rolls can follow one of three rhythms, depending on how closed the rolls are performed, as shown below:

We can likely discount the 3^rd example of 5-stroke rolls as played as 64^th notes. There’s little evidence that the English made a habit of performing 64^th note rolls:

Both Benjamin Clark’s manuscript (1797) and Issac Day’s manuscript (1797) show the “Gamut or the Long Roll” as progressing from eighth to sixteenth to 32^nd notes. Robbins (1812) only progresses to 32^nd notes in its Long Roll exercise. Howe (1862) describes an exercise “in 32^nd notes, when as a closed roll” (9).

The first references to a 64^th note roll appears in Keach (1861) and Bruce & Emmet (1862).

Arbeau, in enumerating the different combination of notes, does use a note he refers to as a “fre,” which we would interpret as a 64^th note, when reading his examples as 2/4. It is possible that he is representing 64^th-based rolls and that they were frequently employed in such variations. A French rudiment, the Ra de 5 Sauté, places a 64^th-note 5-stroke roll somewhere within a string of 16^th notes.

We’ll begin with Division 3 and explore how a single 5-stroke roll operates in the base phrase.

What is the rhythm of the Whole Ruffe?

First, we’ll consider whether the roll duple-based 32^nd notes or triplet-based 32^nd notes.

From here, we can extrapolate 4 options:

In the first measure, we attempt to place a duple 5-stroke roll between the ‘pou’ and ‘poung’ stroke. In doing so, we have to steal half of the ‘pou’s value and also end the roll in an awkward position. While this is playable, it seems to ignore the eighth note value of the minim in the original notation.

In the second measure, we allow the duple 5-stroke roll to “roll” into the poung stroke. This allows the ‘pou’ before it to retain its entire value and begins the roll on the eighth note the original minim occupies. There are, however, two problems. Firstly, this forces the ‘poung’ to be performed on the left hand. We know from YDA as well as some other 18^th century sources that the poung stroke is always on the right hand. We could shift the sticking so that there is a right stroke followed by a right-handed 5-stroke roll, but this appears to deviate from the natural alternation established in the base pattern.

Secondly, a ‘whole ruffe’ contains 5 strokes. When a whole ruffe is indicated in Fisher and the Douce manuscript, it clearly indicates that there is a Right Stroke + a Whole Ruffe + a Poung Stroke. Thus, in this second measure, we have lost a stroke.

The above significantly suggests that the tuplet-based 32^nd note 5-stroke roll is the correct rhythm (the 3^rd and 4^th bars).

Does the Whole Ruffe begin on the beat or end on the beat?

Now we need to decide whether the roll ends in its own space (the 3rd bar) or ends with the poung stroke (the 4th bar).

Douce’s manuscript simply explains that the roll should be 5 strokes, but it does not specific how those strokes are organized. Thus he could mean to play RRLLR (and reverse) as a modern drummer would anticipate, or to play LRRLL. The first seems to match our expectation for rolls, in which they lead to a beat, whereas the second leads away from the beat.

To solve this issue, it will be helpful to look at Division 7, the most complex of the ‘whole Ruffe’ based embellished lines.

From there, we can extrapolate 3 options utilizing the triplet-based 32^nd note 5-stroke roll:

Example 2: Leading into the beat

This example is the most traditional example of creating a 5-stroke roll that leads onto the beat.

This phrasing is similar to how 5-stroke rolls are used in single drag beatings, like Peas Upon a Trencher or La Diane.

Evidence of Tuplet-Based 5-Stroke Rolls

Many known phrases in 18^th century English and early 19^th century American drum music imitate this interpretation.

The first example comes in the Points of War, or the beginning of the English Reveille performed at 120 bpm.

In YDA, we see a poung stroke ending two different 5-stroke rolls – at the end of the first phrase, and the end of the line. This suggests a tendency of ending a 5-stroke roll with a poung stroke, particularly to end the line. The beginning of the line also shows an acceptance of commencing the beating with a right stroke, rather than “rolling” into the measure.

Similar tendencies occur in the Common Time Marches that proliferate American 1812-era drum manuals. Ashworth’s Common Time March provides the simplest variation of marches seen in multiple drum manuals, and specifically that continues in American military tradition into the mid-18^th century. See Klinehanse (1853), Bruce & Emmett (1862), Howe (1862), Keach (1862), and Strube (1869).

Of note in Ashworth’s Common Time March is the use of the two 5-stroke rolls, commencing off the first beat of the measure and leading into the second beat.

Division 7 Appears in Marches

Similar patterns appear in Rumrille’s Ohio March, General Brown’s March, General Scott’s March, and Queenstown Heights. In Ohio March, Rumrille also includes the phrase:

Though a transitional phrase and not an ending phrase, this measure appears to be the same as the third interpretation of Division 7.

Division 3 Appears in Marches

Several manuals, including Rumrille’s marches listed above and Robbinson’s 2^nd and 3^rd Common Time Marches, include the phrase:

Robbinson explains that Two Flams and a Five “is performed by giving a right hand flam, a left hand flam, and a five stroke roll immediately succeeding” and that when performed “there should be no distinction between the second flam and the five” (8).

How to interpret Divisions 2, 3, 4, 5, & 7?

With these later patterns, in addition to the rhythm depicted in Division 2, we can now translate five of the eight divisions:

Want some practice guides that will help develop these ‘whole ruffes’ or triplet 5-stroke rolls? Check out: Double Stroke Roll Practice Guide and The Three Camps Practice Guide.

Division 1: The Voluntary

The remaining three divisions are longer, spanning the length of two phrases or measures. Since Divisions 1, 6, and 8 appear to end in the same manner, we will focus on the translation of Division 1 first before moving onto the more complicated final divisions.

Based on relative values of the notes and the function of ‘R’ when attached to a minim, we can interpret Division 1 with relative ease:

In measure 2, neither the Warrant version nor Fisher’s manuscript suggest that there should be a Drag / Ruff, but the Warrant does indicate the rhythm notated above.

There is some evidence, however, from the Douce manuscript and YDA to suggest that there ought to be a Drag there.

Division 1 could, therefore, be performed with or without the Drag, but the rhythm appears correct.

Divisions 6 & 8: Half Ruffe and the Ruffe & Half joined together

Division 6 and 8 are both longer divisions, with Division 8 appearing to be an embellishment on Division 6. Like Division 1, they can easily be broken into two parts.

In the first half, they both rely on a new rudiment, which therefore makes these lines distinct from the more basic embellishments seen in 3, 4, 5, and 7. The second half appears to either be the same or very similar as Division 1.

In Divisions 6 and 8, we see the symbol ‘R’ being used in its typical context – beneath a minim – but also under a semiminima (which we translate to mean a sixteenth note).

These new use of the ‘R’ is explained in Fisher and the Douce Manuscript: a “halfe Ruffe” and a ‘Ruffe and a halfe joyned together”. Before we can fully unpack the rhythm and sound of these divisions, we must first understand how to perform these two new rudiments.

A Halfe Ruffe

The “Half Ruffe” most likely indicates a Stroke and a Drag.

Both Douce and Fisher list a “Half Ruffe”, which Douce explains “is 4 stroaks beginning easy, & ending hard” (qtd. in Byrne 53). The half Ruffe with a slightly different symbol can be played hard all the way through (but this is not included in the English March).

Based on the name and description of how to play, the first assumption might be that this is a Single Stroke 4, but evidence suggests otherwise. By comparing Douce’s version of The Retreat – played as a half ruffe + plain stroke; half ruffe + poung stroke – we can see an obvious translation based on two known versions of the Retreat (from The Young Drummer’s Assistant, Potter, Ashworth, etc.).

Based on this, the half Ruffe is more probably played like the Swiss Ruff, or French Ra Simple. This seems to be confirmed by the presence of modern Drags in The Young Drummer’s Assistant’s Foot March that correspond with the placement of Fisher’s and Douce’s half Ruffe’s.

The half Ruffe can be identified in the Warrant version by two consecutive Quarter Notes, the first with “pou” and the second with the letter “R” below. Based on the notation in the Warrant version, we should assume that the ‘R’ indicates the commencement of the double stroke.

A Whole and a Halfe Ruffe Together

The other rudiment, a whole and a half Ruffe together, can then be understood as a five-stroke roll and a drag combined together.

This might be refer to a Treble Paradiddle. Check out my discussion of this extinct rudiment.

In short, Douce explains that “a Ruffe & half […] is 8 stroaks” (qtd. in Byrne 53).

Since a whole Ruffe is 5 strokes and a half is 4, we can assume that the end of the 5 stroke roll begins the 4 stroke roll, to make a total of 8 strokes.

A whole and half Ruffe can be identified in the Warrant by two consecutive Quarter Notes, both with the letter “R” below. Using the same assumptions about the 5-stroke roll, the five begins with a single stroke on the beat; the end of the 5 is the first stroke of the half ruff.

An argument could be made that the whole and half Ruffe represent a 9-stroke roll, with the 8 strokes described by Douce being the doubles and the following “pou” the final stroke. I experimented with this option, but found that it required breaking rules previously established with the 5-stroke roll. I also found the mixing of terms unlikely (why would a 9 be called a “whole and a half”, rather than something else?).

With these two rudiments, we can now incorporate the rolls into the rhythm depicted above.

We now nearly have a full picture of the 8 Divisions of the English March.

Rudiments of the English March: Petang

The final note listed in the Warrant version shows a “petang”. Alternative spellings include Potang (Derby copy), Petang (Huntindon copy), Potoung (Pepys), and “pou pong” (Holme).

This rudiment is made up of a semiminim and a minim; when translated into 3/4, it would be a sixteenth note and an eighth note, which perhaps is best understood as an open Flam.

No such note is included in Fisher’s or The Young Drummer’s Assistant’s versions of the march, offering no further clues. The existing copy of the Douce MS is incomplete and does not have the music for the final division.

In the copy of the original warrant, there is no fermata over the final note; there is one, however, included in Pepys’ copy. Also, Holme’s version breaks down the name into a “pou pong”. The spelling of some versions of the name suggests a relationship to the Poung stroke.

Petang = Poung Flam

Based on the rhythm and potential relationship to a poung stroke, we can make a reasonable assumption that this stroke is a poung-flam.

Although not named in YDA, there are appearances of flams in which the right hand plays a poung stroke, while the left hand presumably hits the center of the drum. Such a stroke produces the snap of a plain stroke as well as the excessive reverberation of a poung stroke.

This may also account for the descriptions of a poung stroke as a flam played near the rims seen in some 19^th century manuals.

The English March

Here is the complete interpretation of the English March based on the above.

Download music for the English March.

---

Now we have a complete view of the English Foot March.

If needed, refer back to the discussion on the rhythm of the English March.

To continue, check out:

• The Fife and The English March
• Performing The English March

Have your own thoughts on the rudiments in the English march? Contact me with resources on the English March or comment below.