What is drum? By AwankProduction

I read an article on aceh forum community ,drum actually contains snare, tom toms, cymbal, conga , bass drum, bedug, tabla and etc. they are actually drums we play it with our hands or with our sticks. But what we are talking is about Drum set, drum set is the most modern form, it consist of snare, bass drum, and tom toms, tom toms divided on two things : mounted tom toms and floor tom toms (depend on the placement and diameter), from those three thing there is important things to add, that is cymbal, hard ware (pedal, hi hat stand, cymbal stand, snare stand, tom holder/tom stand), drum head

Tom toms consist many kind size, from the depth and diameter, the drum size usually written in 12x10 it means the depth of 12 inch and 10 inch diameter, tom toms have many kind of variation diameter, from the smallest 6 inch continue to 8”, 10”, 12”, 13”, 14”, 15”, 16”,18”, and 20”, 14” above usually called floor tom but it also depends on the placement, tom toms use 2 drum head, top and bottom, except in 1970’s tom toms and bass drums use only one drum head and the sound is very awful. Tom toms body or usually called shell made from wood. The beginner class usually made from mahogany and for professional class made from maple and birch, maple and birch are very expensive because it produce clear and punchy sound or tone. Tom toms shell have depth from 4 mm to 10 mm, the thinner the shell the more perfect, sensitive, richer the tom toms sound produce, but the thicker the shell the sound is more loud, but it’s not rich or sensitive sound.

Bass drum is not to different from toms, the different is the bass drum have bigger diameter 16”, 18”, 20”, 22”, 24”, even 26” or more. We use a pedal to hit the bass drum and we place it on the bottom, but the sound is different from toms, it’s not “DUNG” but “DUG”(more low), the bass drum shell is more thicker to produce a loud sound and for it capability to stand with the hard we kick it!

Snare drum is the different among other parts(from the shape and Sound), snare is the main part of the instrument(the most high hit frequency), size of the snare usually 10” to 15” but the must common use is 14”,the difference from other part is the bottom of the snare, the bottom of the snare using spiral wire or called snare wire/strainer, if you hit the upper head the bottom snare wire will response, it produce sharp sound, the soul of the snare is from the wire snare, if you release the snare wire, the sound is just the same with tom toms.

Cymbal, yet again is the soul for drum set because it’s not almost possible playing drum without hitting the cymbal ( it’s like having sex but without woman, you know what I mean!!)

Cymbal consist 4 parts:

1.hi hat cymbal

It’s like the heart of the drum, used to keep the time/tempo, consist with a 8” to 15” pair cymbal, the standard size is 14”

2.Ride cymbal

The same thing with hi hat but different sound and shape, consist 1 cymbal but have a big size from 1`8” to 22” , the standard size is 20”

3.crash cymbal

Use for give a phrase/melody to a song, size 13” to 22” depends on the drummer

4. effects cymbal

Consist china, splash, bell and swiss, it’s use to give unique colors to the music, splash and bell usually size 6” to 12”,and for china and swiss, usually size 16” to 22”

Hardware:

1.Bass pedal, use for kicking the drum, there are also double pedal, it have 2 beater to produce more sound on the bass drum

2.Hi hat stand, to place the hi hat cymbal that consist 2 cymbal so that you can open and close the cymbal with your left foot

3.Cymbal stand, to put the cymbal except hi hat cymbal

4.Snare stand, to place the snare and you can change the position what ever you like

5.Tom holder, to place the tom toms

Drum head have many kind different size, type, thick and function.

Drum consist 3 parts:

1.batter head, it’s the part that we hit with stick drum

2.resonant, it’s place on the bottom tom toms and the front of the bass drum, this head is not to be hit, it give a life or soul to tom toms and bass drum

3.snare side, it place specially on the bottom to produce the snare wire sound. Snare side is the most thin head so don’t hit it with your stick!!