DIY external bass drum muffler

I recent scored this because I wanted to muffle the echo of my bass drum a little.
This may be more than I was looking for. It's a lot bigger than the photo indicated...

I'm taking the bass drum to Revival Sunday to get some help with setting up the drum to take both a ride cymbal AND a small rack tom, using the hardware the drum came with.
I'm hoping I can get away with something that isn't too complicated and which won't topple over from excess weight. I don't plan to use a floor tom with this kit so I need everything to be compact and minimalist. I hope they can help me with the cymbal mount as well.

Product Review: Prologix Green Method Pad -- and the pitfalls of redundancy

I'd been wanting to try one of the Prologix pads for several years, but the price of their early models was a little steep for my budget back then. Last week, an old college friend with some money reached out to me. Her son plays in a school band program and she wanted to gift the drumline with a matched set of practice pads. The school's band director isn't a percussionist and couldn't decide which pad to order with this lady's generous gift, so my friend read my reviews and got some info that way. She'd heard about Prologix pads and noticed that I hadn't reviewed them, so she arranged for me to buy one and put it through its paces. ("It's the school colors, green and black," she enthused. "Perhaps this would be a great way to go!")

It arrived a few days ago and I've had some time to hang out with it.

Prologix Percussion makes pads with different densities of rubber compound, and the idea is that you select the density you need based on your playing style and goals. The green compound is designed for "light" resistance, meaning it will provide more of a rebound and allow you to approximate the feel of an actual drum. (They also make compounds with higher levels of resistance, meaning you mjust work on "pulling" the strokes out of the surface, a great workout for hands and wrists. Check their web site for more info.)

I ordered the 12" Method pad, a two-sided affair which Prologix calls their "base level" pad, suitable for drummers at all experience levels. One side has the green rubber surface; the other side uses recycled tire rubber to achieve a feel that's harder and closer to a modern marching drumhead. Both sides have their purposes and both work well.

The pad is heavy enough to stay out on a tabletop, and large enough to work in a standard snare drum stand. At 12 inches it's also portable and will easily fit in a backpack or book bag.

The feel of the light green surface is quite similar to what you'd find on the Evans Real Feel gray chop pad.
The subtle difference in hardness between the two means that on the Prologix you will still have to work a little more to achieve good technique.

The reverse side of recycled rubber is harder and less forgiving in terms of natural rebound, so that you still must use good technique but will get a sound and feel that is tighter and more like a high-tension Kevlar head.

The thickness of each surface is evident from the side view. Both surfaces are mounted to a standard compressed wood platform that looks sturdy and durable for most purposes.

 

 

 

 

 

 Here's a very short video demonstrating the difference between the playing surfaces.

Below is a photo that explains my quandry: All three of these pads -- early Xymox (Promark), Prologix and Evans -- utilize a very similar rubber compound that is designed to offer a high degree of natural rebound while also remaining quieter than a real drum.



But the difference in feel between the three pads is SO subtle that I have to ask:
At what point does all of these different models become redundant?
And at what point should manufacturers take a step back and begin to ask this very question of themselves? The photo above demonstrates just three of the many pad makers out there who are creating pads using similar rubber compounds. Other pads using a silicone base and achieving similar results should be asking this question as well.

..::ducks to avoid flying debris from people who love free market capitalism::..

To be honest, there are already perfectly good pads out there that serve the same purpose as this one by Prologix. And they are similarly priced, which only serves to make things more confusing.

The Method pad is a nice pad. It costs $35 from Prologix, placing it in a similar price-point as the Even Real Feel pad. A smaller 6" version is available for $20. But to my perspective it doesn't really break any new ground from a technical standpoint. And since the Evans Real Feel pad has been around a bit longer, it's easier o find used pads at a considerable savings, something I generally encourage for individual students on a budget. There really isn't enough of a difference between the Real Feel and the Prologix Method pad for me to say one is unequivocally better or worse.

Because of all the redundancy in modern pad design, I've decided that, going forward, I will probably focus more of my attention of pad designs that truly count as breakthroughs, rather than re-hashes of similar designs already out there.  Nothing against any of these brands; but in a world where environmental and financial concerns are only increasing it makes sense to focus on that which is truly innovative.

Happy drumming!

Drumming as part of the songwriter's craft

I'm dropping this here so I can share with you how my two musical loves -- songwriting and drumming -- can intersect. Not a lot explanation, just, well,  here you go. Enjoy.

"Count to Four" by Beth Hamon, performed at URJ Biennial, Chicago, Jan 2020

"There Was No Voice" - music by Beth Hamon, Lyrics by Stacey Zisook Robinson
Performed March 12, 2021 in Portland, OR

#drumgoals: Wilcoxon's All-American Drum Solos

I've decided to set a new drumming goal for myself.
Inspired by Kevin Lehman and his FB Group devoted to collecting recordings of each of the 150 solos in Wilcoxon's "All American Drum Solos" and having contributed a couple of videos to that group. I've decided to work my way through the entire book, all 150 drum solos.

The book is a masterpiece of short snare drum solos that range from reasonably easy to quite challenging, and which call on the player to get comfortable with each of the 26 drum rudiments as codified by NARD.

I began late last week and dove right in. I am having a blast. I read the solo through a few times, very slowly, then a begin breaking apart the solo in small chunks and cleaning it up. Eventually, the solo is clean enough for me to put it all back together and begin to play it at gradually increasing tempi.

Along the way, I'm reacquainting myself with the rudiments I don't get to use as often in my playing. And I'm acquainting myself with a wonderful collection of snare drum solos that will challenge me and that are a delight to play.

Stay tuned. The solos I find the most musical I'll videotape and share here.
Happy drumming.

Vintage Corner: Slingerland drum UPDATE 3

Yesterday and today, I hurled some love at the rims and the shell.

The drum came to me last summer in pretty bad shape. After careful cleaning, the rims shows fatigue in several spots and the shell had been gouged pretty badly in a couple of spots. I had to decide how much time and effort I wanted to invest, and wheter of not it was worth it.

In the end, I chose a compromise.

Since the shell and rims were still pretty nicely round, I decided to honor the "beausage" (literally, "beauty through usage") the drum had acquired over the decades. After repairing the worst of the cracks (which I did with R's help), I decided I would lightly sand some of the roughest spots, leave the old varnish on everything else, and cover the sanded spots with some clear nail polish. It's not what a real woddworker would do, but I'm not a woodworker and decided that the drum looked more beautiful with its war wounds. (I certainly didn't want to cover the beautiful wood with colored paint! And I couldn't justify the cost of NOS wood hoops for a drum so beat up.)

The rim repair that Ron had helped me with has held nicely, supported by the pieces of bicycle spoke I inserted. All that remained was selective sanding and varnishing with clear nail polish.

The batter rim was marked with spots where the hooks had gathered rust underneath, which had soaked into the wood. Sanding would remove more wood before it removed the rust stains, so I sanded lightly and then varnished with nail polish.

 

The shell posed another aesthetic challenge because a previous owner had gouged it, maybe with a belt buckle while marching.
The gouging had worn through multiple layers of the ply, and while there's still plenty of wood there, filling the depression with wood putty would have been more of a headache than I was prepared for. (I just have a little Tuff-Shed where I fix bikes. Not roomy or fancy.) So I sanded the area lightly to smooth it out a little, cleaned it, and then applied more nail polish.

The nice thing about nail polish is that it fills the grain nicely, and dries quickly between coats

The other thing about mahogany is how it shines when the light catches the grain, even when it's been banged up.

The shell just glows, in a way it didn't when I first got this drum.

That's why I chose to let the drum keep its patina, earned through a hundred performances and a thousand rehearsals, played by any number of hands.

This one's a keeper, and I can't wait until tomorrow to sling it up and try it out.

Video coming soon.
Below: Before, and after.

Vintage Corner: Slingerland Drum UPDATE 2: Rims and shell

Since I was gifted with this drum last summer, here's the progress:

1. I took it all apart so I could begin to clean the hardware and repair the cracks in the snare-side maple hoop.

2.  I gave the bottom hoop to my brother-in-law, a woodworker, so he could soak it and bring the cracked section back into round with the rest of the hoop. This process took a couple of weeks.

3. While I waited for that piece to get finished (in between Ron's professional woodworking jobs), I cleaned the rods and hooks using a Rust Remover stick and finishing with some Nevr-Dull.

4. I got the hoop back from Ron, and finished the repair by adding sections of bicycle spoke to strengthen the repaired crack. I also began removing the tape residue from the rims and shell.

First, the snare hoop. The repair looked pretty good, nice and solid; but Ron advised me that without adding some internal supports it would eventually weaken and break again from tension and repeated playing. So I found a drill bit the right size and carefully drilled two tiny holes through the center of the rim, across the repaired crack. Because the other side of the hoop was showing the beginning of the same fatigue, I drilled holes there too.

The holes were run directly crosswise through the crack and the glue used to repair it.




Then, I took an old bicycle spoke and measured off sections long enough to run through the hoop, with perhaps a couple millimeters counter-sunk on either end.
I checked my work by running a spoke through the hole. It fit perfectly.

Then I measured sections of the spoke and cut off four pieces.

I squirted super-glue into each hole, chased it through with a section of metal spoke, and made sure each end was slightly counter-sunk when finished. Then I set the hoop sideways to allow everything to dry overnight. (By using a thicker gel instead of liquid glue, I was assured that glue would not drip out all over the place.)

The next morning, everything looked fine. I'll need to decide whether or not I want to try and fill in the ends with some wood putty, or just let it be.

Then I turned my attention to removing tape residue from the shell. A friend in Seattle had given me a bottle of an environmentally-friendly solvent called "Best Cleaner Ever," and I tried it.
Following the instructions, I sprayer a little on, let it soak in for a few minutes and then tried to wipe it off. It did nothing to remove the residue; and in fact the solvent itself had to wiped down thoroughly with warm water to remove its own residue. In the end, it may have loosened the tape residue, but that masking tape had been there for fifty or more years, so it's hard to know. I had to carefully scrape it away with a pocket knife, applied gently enough to remove the tape without gouging the wood underneath.

When I was done, I was left with a shell that still show signs of use and abuse, but the luster of the mahogany also showed up nicely. So I've chosen to leave the shell alone, not removing the original clear paint. I will apply some clear coat to the spots or bare wood that need it, and let the "beausage" be a part of the drum's look. The mahogany itself is gorgeous enough, even with the damage.

I still have some residue to remove from the batter hoop tonight. After that, I'll probably sand both hoops lightly, apply something to seal the bare wood spots, and let it all dry for a few days.
Then I'll begin reassembling the drum.
I don't plan to use a leg rest with this drum, but will instead just let it hang against my leg at a tilt. It will be a fair-weather drum only, or if I use it indoors it will be on a stand.
This was an unexpected gift and I'm glad I've had time to learn from repairing and rebuilding it.
Next: video of the finished drum. Coming soon!

Vintage Corner: Bower pad, replica

The first U.S. patent granted for a drum practice pad dates to 1920, for a design by H. A. Bower.

Before this, drummers generally made their own practice pads, or simply played on the tabletop or whatever horizontal surface was handy. Since they were playing on calfskin heads, the idea of using a piece of tanned leather as a playing surface for a portable pad wasn't a stretch. Bower was the first on record to apply for a U.S. patent for such a device.

Here's his design:

As you can see, it's a pretty simple, even crude, design by modern standards. A wooden board is cut to a desired size (in this case, a 12" round). A smaller piece of thick tanned leather that fits inside the diameter is selected, holes are drilled in both and the leather is affixed to the board with string or a shoelace. According to the notes submitted with the patent application, a thin layer of stuffing may be placed under the leather for a slightly softer sound, which would come in handy if you're practicing while on tour.

Scouting around the interwebs, I found that someone had already tried making a replica based on the notes from the patent application.

He also affixed a copy of the label from the first mass-produced version of this pad, licensed to and sold by Art Higman in Los Angeles in the 1920s.

I was curious about how such a pad would sound and feel, so I decided to make one for myself and find out. It was simple: A piece of scrap wood (Mine is about 8.5 inches in diameter because that's what I had on hand), a piece of tanned, undyed leather about 6 inches square and 1.5 mm thick, and a layer of wool batting roughly 3m thick sandwiched between. Holes were drilled in the leather and wood to line up properly, the batting was cut a little narrower to fit in between, and the whole thing was bound together with a shoelace. I also photocopied a picture of the label and glued it on the bottom.

(NOTE: After putting together, I realized that the additional single hold on one side may have been for purposes of increasing the tension on the shoelace, and thereby possibly tightening the leather against the platform a little more. I'm not sure, but next time I get out my drill, I may add that hole and relace the whole thing and see what happens.)

Considering the simplicity of the design, it seems doubtful that such a device would be awarded a patent today. But back in 1919 when the application was filed, the patent office probably hadn't seen or thought about anything like this before.

Here's my replica pad: 

And here's a very short video of my trying it out, first on top of a regular pad and then on my lap (because the pad kept creeping on top of my other pad):

The feel is actually not that bad. When you remember that a 1920 drummer would use this for quiet practice and then play on a drum with a calfskin head, the feel is probably just about right. Lower-tensioned drums of this era would require the player to "pull" the strokes out of the drum, a technique that is not required (or useful) on high-tension Kevlar-headed drums today.

The shoelace prevents a flat, flush connection between the bottom of the pad and the head of a drum, which may be why there's significant "creep". However, a 12-inch pad could also be mounted on a drum stand with pretty good results, provided it could be secured tightly in the basket.

I'm glad I did this, as the experience gives me more information about drumming technique and practice approaches from this era. However, I'll be content and not try to make another in a 12-inch size for now.

Happy drumming.