R&B and soul drum patterns.

10 R&B and soul patterns at 72 BPM. Play one, change any step, take it to your DAW as MIDI.

R&B drums are slow, sparse and slightly late. The kick and snare are the hip hop pattern at two-thirds the speed, the hats fill in sixteenths or sit back in eighths, and the swing is set so the snare arrives a breath after you expect it. Soul before it had its own conventions, the snare on every beat of the Motown years and the shuffle of the church, and this page carries both.

Slow jam. Kick on one and the and of two, snare on two and four, eighth hats with swung pickups before three and one, a rim into the next bar, at 72.

Hat
Rim
Snare
Kick

Drop a sound on any row to play it there.

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Neo soul, drunk. The swing at 65 and the snare on the a of one and three, a sixteenth late: the lean.

Hat
Shaker
Snare
Kick

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Snare on every beat. The Motown convention: snare on all four beats, tambourine (shaker) in eighths, kick on one and three.

Hat
Shaker
Snare
Kick

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Open in the drum sequencer →

Sixteenth hats. Closed hats on every sixteenth with an open one on the and of four: the ninety-BPM groove.

Open hat
Hat
Snare
Kick

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Gospel shuffle. On the twelve-step bar: the ride shuffling on the first and third of every three, a kick on every beat, a rim before three and one: church on a Sunday.

Ride
Rim
Snare
Kick

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Half-time ballad. Snare on three, kick on one and the a of three, a shaker for the air.

Hat
Shaker
Snare
Kick

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Open in the drum sequencer →

Two bars, trap-soul. Bar two has an 808 under the kicks and a hat roll into the snare: the modern crossover.

Hat
Snare
808
Kick

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Sparse intro. Kick on one and a rim on four, nothing else and nothing swung, at 72.

Rim
Kick

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Nineties swing beat. Swing at 60, kick on one and the a of two, snare on two and four, hats in eighths: the new jack end.

Open hat
Hat
Snare
Kick

Drop a sound on any row to play it there.

Open in the drum sequencer →

Chorus with clap and crash. The slow jam with a clap on the snare, open hat on the and of four and a crash on one.

Crash
Open hat
Hat
Clap
Snare
Kick

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Open in the drum sequencer →

How an R&B and soul beat is built

The kick

The snare and the rim on two and four

Hats

Then a variation: Neo soul, drunk

The slow jam: kick on steps 1 and 7, the and of two; snare on 5 and 13; hats on the eighths with a doubled hat on steps 8 and 16, the pickups the swing at 56 pushes late; a rim on step 15 to lead into the next bar; 72 BPM. Neo soul moves the snare to steps 6 and 14, a sixteenth late, and raises the swing to 65, which is the drunk feel producers otherwise nudge by hand. The Motown convention is the opposite: snare on all four beats, steps 1, 5, 9 and 13, a tambourine (the shaker row) on every eighth, straight, at 120. Sixteenth hats at 90 with an open hat on step 15 is the nineties groove. The gospel shuffle moves to a twelve-step bar, three steps to a beat, with the ride on the first and third of every three and a kick on every beat. The half-time ballad is a snare on step 9 only at 64. The two-bar pattern adds an 808 and a hat roll in the second bar, where R&B and trap meet today.

More drum patterns

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Questions.

What tempo is R&B?

60 to 95 BPM, and the grid opens at 72. Slow jams sit at 60 to 70; the nineties groove around 90; neo soul anywhere in between with the swing turned up.

What is the drunk or lazy feel?

The snare landing a little late and the hats swung unevenly, so the beat seems to lean back. On the grid: snare a sixteenth late and swing at 62 to 66. In a DAW, nudge the snare a few milliseconds late on top.

Why does the Motown pattern have a snare on every beat?

Because that was the convention of the sessions: snare on all four with a tambourine, which makes a record feel urgent without being fast. It's on this page because it's still the soul pattern people ask for.

More free tools

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Drum sequencer

Program a beat on a 16-step grid.

Drum pad

16 pads on your keyboard, your own sounds too.

Metronome

A steady click, and a click track to download.