The Highest of Hats

Basically every drum set, from rock to country to jazz, has a piece called a hi-hat (or hi-hats, depending on who you ask).  It looks like this:

It's two small cymbals sandwiched together.  It's great for keeping rhythm without making a loud sound, like during the verses of a song.  The pedal changes it from open (where there's a small space between the two) to closed (where they are right next to each other, touching).  The picture above shows the hi-hat as open.  Here's a good demonstration - the long string of yellow notes is the drummer playing the hi-hat closed, and when it switches to a blue note, the hi-hat is opened, quickly played, then closed again before the next note.  The first time it happens is at 0:12 in the linked video.  That splashy sound you hear is the hi-hat being hit while it's open, then the drummer pushing down on the pedal and closing the hi-hat while it's still ringing from the hit.  It's a pretty cool sound.  You can also just leave it open, but it sounds more similar to a standard crash or splash cymbal that way, as opposed to the cool closing sound.

The problem is that this is really hard to play correctly.  It's not just the coordination of using a fourth limb - that is a challenge in itself, though.  The hardest part is the fact that you end up opening and closing it between notes.  If you look at the demonstration below, the drummer is holding down the hi-hat pedal until the red line, at which point he lets the pedal up for a sec, plays the blue note and the yellow bar (hi-hat and kick drum), then presses the pedal down again to close the hi-hat at the purple line, then plays the next set of notes (yellow closed hi-hat and red snare).  

It's tough!  My brain wants to either let up the pedal at the same time I hit the note (which is too late), or wants to press down on the pedal again at the same time as the next yellow note (too late again).  It's very hard to get used to lifting up the pedal and pushing it down again between notes.  The reason I mention all of this is because I've been trying to learn how to play the hi-hat correctly.  I can do it fairly well on simple (slow) beats, but something as fast as Tom Sawyer (shown above) absolutely kicks my ass.  It's just another one of those things that really makes you appreciate how talented and coordinated good drummers really are.