''Snare rush'' is a term often used in electro culture to refer to impossibly fast
rolls. A snare rush can vary in
tempo
In musical terminology, tempo ( Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (ofte ...
considerably, from
16th note
Figure 1. A 16th note with stem facing up, a 16th note with stem facing down, and a 16th rest.
Figure 2. Four 16th notes beamed together.
In music, a 1/16, sixteenth note (American) or semiquaver (British) is a note played for half the dura ...
s even to
2048th note
In music, a two hundred fifty-sixth note (or occasionally demisemihemidemisemiquaver) is a note played for of the duration of a whole note. It lasts half as long as a hundred twenty-eighth note and takes up one quarter of the length of a sixty-f ...
s. At that sort of speed, the effect is a buzzing sound, but with a detectable
pitch, so some artists vary the repeat rate, and can even play a
tune. One example of this would be the last 18 seconds of "
Ghetto Body Buddy" by
Venetian Snares
Aaron Funk (born January 11, 1975), known as Venetian Snares, is a Canadian electronic musician based in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He is widely known for innovating and popularising the breakcore genre, and is one of the most recognisable artists to ...
, where the
theme from ''
Sesame Street
''Sesame Street'' is an American educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Workshop until June 2000) and ...
'' is played using only extremely fast snare rushes. The defining characteristic of a snare rush, as opposed to a roll, is the sheer virtuosity it would take for a physical drummer to play a successful one. As such, almost all snare rushes are computer programmed and can be used with
bass drum
The bass drum is a large drum that produces a note of low definite or indefinite pitch. The instrument is typically cylindrical, with the drum's diameter much greater than the drum's depth, with a struck head at both ends of the cylinder. T ...
s,
tom-toms, and
cymbals to intensify the effect. They are often used as