Ten Simple Drum Fills [MIDI Included]

October 27, 2023

Adding fills can to a beat can be challenging, but we break it down here. Here’s ten simple drum fills you can add to any one of your drum beats.

Simple Drum Fills

For these drum fills we’re going to keep it simple and only use:

Snare
Hi Tom
Mid Tom
Lo Tom

10 patterns using the above to add in a simple drum fill.

The Setup

Here's the base beat we'll work with. This beat is two bars. The drum fills will cover the last two beats of the second bar. Let's listen

Here's what that looks like in MIDI format, plus the end space where we'll add in the MIDI fills.

a drum beat with midi notes in a piano roll.

Let's fill in the last two beats with some fills. Here's ten drum fills you can easily add to your beat.

Simple Hi-Lo

Simply going from snare to hi-tom, to mid-tom, to lo-tom.

[Snare • Snare • Hi Tom • Hi Tom • Mid Tom • Mid Tom • Low Tom • Low Tom]

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI notes in a piano roll showing a simple drum fill of snares, hi toms, mid toms, and low toms

Double Up Build Up

This is simply playing the Snare and Low Tom over and over again. The kicker is the volume/velocity increases each time. So you're playing two notes and the intensity builds up as you play both of them louder each time.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI notes in a piano roll. It's a snare and a low tom repeatedly being played with the velocity of each increasing each time

Mid Hi Lo

This is another straightforward drum fill similar to the Simple HI Lo. Instead it starts of the Mid Tom, goes to the Hi Tom, then ends on the Lo Tom. And like the Simple Hi Lo, it starts with the snares. Two hits on each note.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI notes in a piano roll showing two snares, then two mid toms, then two hi toms, and lastly two low toms

HiLo Snare Anchor

Hi Lo Snare Anchor is a drum fill anchored by the snare. It starts with two snares, then instead of two tom hits like we've seen before, we do a single tom hit followed by a snare.

So we'll see a hi tom hit, then a snare. A mid tom hit followed by a snare, and then a low tom hit followed by a snare.

It still follows the general pattern of starting at the hi tom then mid tom, then low tom.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI notes in a piano roll showing two snares then a hi tom, snare, then mid tom and snare, then a low tom and then snare.

Go Low Go Hi

This is sort of two patterns back to back. The first is a four hit patterns with low toms and the snare. It then transitions to a similar pattern but between the mid tome and the high tom.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI drums in a piano roll showing a drum fill. It shows a 4 note pattern alternating between low toms and snares. That's followed by a similar pattern alternating between the mid tom and the high tom

Anchor Snare

This is similar to Hi Lo Anchor snare. Instead of going from hi tom to low tom, this start with the mid tom, then high, and the low. All with the snare being the anchor here. So again we don't hear two toms in a row like we did in earlier fills. After each tom hit, we'll hear a snare.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI notes showing a drum fill anchored in a snare hit. It's two snare hits then a mid tom, snare, high tom, snare, low tom and finishes with a snare.

Broken

All drum fills up until this point have been 8 notes covering those last two beats. In this one we're going to break it up a bit. Here we're only going to use six notes. The break adds an interesting feel to a fill.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

a midi drum fill in a piano roll showing two snares followed by a high tom. There's then a break for a beat, followed by two mid toms, a low tom, and then another break for a beat.

Syncopation

This is similar to the Broken fill we just covered. Instead the notes are stressed on the weaker beats.

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

a drum fill midi notes in a piano roll using syncopation. It starts with two snares, a break, then a high tom, a break, a mid tom, a break, and then finishes with a low tom.

Flam Fills

Flams are a popular technique used by drummers. It involves playing two of the same notes right after each other. The first note is a grace note - played lightly. Here we'll use flams with hi lo pattern we saw earlier.

[obvious note: you don't have to use flams just for drum fills, they're nice to drop in from time to time in your main beat]

Here's the audio

And here's what the MIDI looks like

a drum fill in midi notation in a piano roll using Flams. It goes from snare to high tom, to mid tom, to low tom. Each hit has a flam.

Crash Doubles

Ok we're going to pivot a bit from our typical notes and introduce a Crash. We'll start with this and then follow it up with low and mid toms being played together. We'll use the build up technique so the volume of each of those double notes increases with each hit.

Here's the audio

and here's what the MIDI looks like

MIDI fills in the piano roll starting with a crash. It is then followed up by a series of mid and low toms being played together. Each note gets progressively louder.

BONUS: Snare Rolls

Part of making fills stand out is nailing the snare roll. If you want something that sounds like this:

The key is in:

Packing the snare
Increase the volume as you go
Finish strong with a rimshot

Learn more on how to make snare rolls.

Fade Out

Those are ten simple drum fills you can add to your beat. I used a snare and three toms but play around with different sounds. Perhaps you want to use a snare, a rim, and two toms for example.

Experiment and have fun.