Buying a Drumset

Introduction
I spent many years managing the drum department of a successful music store. It is because of this experience that I am motivated to write this article. Unfortunately, this is often the scene... parents coming into a brightly lit, colorful drum shop, and with their heads spinning with all of the choices before them, they walk out without a drumset. Or worse yet, with one and feeling as though they were taken advantage of because they were not well informed. It's my hope that with this article new drum buyer's, young and old, and parents looking to get their child that ever so precious "first drum kit" will be informed and even confident as they parade out into the competitive market place to arm the aspiring drummer.
There are a number of things to consider when purchasing a new drumkit. The first question often is should I buy a drumkit or should I start out with a pad and sticks? The commonly held belief is that any new drum student should start out with a basic drum pad and learn how to play all of the rudiments, and then consider purchasing a snare drum and work up eventually to a drumkit.
That is one school of thought and it is certainly a safer and quieter way to approach the drums. I am not of the opinion that this should always be the case. There is not and should not be a hard set rule when deciding between drums and a pad. It must be decided by the player and/or the parents whether or not to buy drums to start out. Ask yourself these questions...How long have you or your child been wanting to be a drummer? If that desire fuels half your waking thoughts, as it does a great deal of young musicians, a drumset may not be a bad investment. If your child takes up a new favorite hobby every two or three weeks, as children and many adults are prone to do, then perhaps a five to fifteen dollar drum pad is not a bad decision. Perhaps some more insight into how to buy a drumset and the costs involved will help to solidify your position.
Construction
What should you look for in a drumkit? The first thing I recommend is that you consider the quality of the drums, that is, the general construction. You get what you pay for, and in the case of drums, a poorly built product does not stand up long under the harsh beating a new drummer can administer. You want to find a drum that has a decent quality hardware. Closely examine how the hardware is attached to the shells. Is it riveted? Or secured tightly with a decent strength nut and bolt or threaded screw. Look for hardware that has a solid feel to it. If you think you or your child will play for more than a few months then thin rivet connected hardware will not hold up. This is especially true with the bass drum pedal and the high hat stand. Do not expect to get the quality hardware of a three thousand dollar kit on your entry level drum set, but comparing the nicer hardware of a more expensive drum set can help you to understand what you are buying.
The next feature to consider are the shells themselves. Depending on the cost of the kit they will range from basic plywood to elegant rock maple. Chances are your first kits shells will range from a very generic plywood to a fancier plywood like birch/mahogany. The drum shell is approximately 25-40% of the drums sound. The percentage gets close to the 40% number, only if the player is skilled at tuning the drums, in which case the subtleties of the wood can be heard. A plywood shell is not necessarily bad at an entry level of playing, in fact they made help to deaden the drum a little bit for the novice tuner to get a better grip on dialing in a nice drum sound. More important is the bearing edge on the drums. This is the end of the drum where the drum head touches the shell. Generally a 45 degree angle on the edge is desirable. Ask your local drum dealer to show you the bearing edge. If it is a quality drum shop they will have no problem doing that for you. Examine the bearing edge, check to be sure that it is not splitting, or that the plies are not separating from each other. Next month, in the second part of this article we will examine the sound characteristics of the drum shells themselves. For now, it’s important to understand that the drum heads account for 50-75% of the drum tone. A thicker, or dual ply head will supply a deeper tone, where a thin single ply will tend to be livelier, and more boomy sounding. Do not rely totally on hitting the drum in the store to ascertain its sound quality. Look more at the construction of the shell for the indication of how it will sound, especially at the entry level of playing. A $45 set of heads will drastically change the tone of the drum for you.

Features
If you have decided that you are going to buy a drumset, your next question is probably, what does the kit consist of? I recommend this configuration at the minimum. 1) Bass Drum (18"-22"), 2) 1-4 Tom Toms (10", 12", 13", 16"), 3) 13" or 14" snare drum 4) HiHat and Stand (13" or 14" HH cymbals) 5) 18" crash/ride Chances are many of the entry level kits will be a five piece configuration which is exactly what I listed. A a separate crash and a ride cymbal as opposed to a crash ride would be preferable, but not necessary at this point.

Price
How much should you pay? The entry level kits we talked about initially, with plywood shells and very thin hardware will list somewhere around $675-$800 with a hh and a cymbal. A good price will range from between $450-$550 for the this initial drumkit. Some of the companies who make kits in this price range are CP, PP, Premier, and a slew of other small companies. The next level in drum kits will put the player into a drumset with a mahogany or a mahogany/birch shell. A nicer brand of ply. The wrapping which is something we have not discussed will be of a better grade, or the drum in some cases may even have a lacquered finish. There is a noticeable quality difference in the hardware at this next price point. The retails on these kits will range from about $900-$1600. You can expect to pay from about $699 and up. I usually tell the new player that the first level of drum is probably going to last them from between 2-5 years depending on the talent, and diligence level. The next level of kit is probably going to be acceptable indefinitely, maybe forever depending on how quickly the student progresses. The kits in the $800 and up price range tend to be quite durable. Almost every mainstream drum manufacturer has a model in this price range.

Heads
There are many different things to consider in the selection of a drum shell. Probably the first thing you should realize is that the drum heads themselves determine approximately 60% of the drum sound. My purpose in telling you this is to make sure that while you are out shopping for a new or used kit, you will understand the effect the current head selection has. A dual ply head, like an Aquarian PF series, a Remo Pinstrip, or an Emperor will produce a deeper and less lively sound. With this type of head the drums will have a deader sound, more or less depending on the amount of muffling built into the head itself. Conversely, a thinner single ply head will deliver a brighter and more lively sound. Popular heads of this type would be Aquarians TC series, Premiers Morgenstein Signature or the ever popular Remo Ambassador or Diplomat series heads. To even further analyze the heads, take into consideration whether they are coated or clear. The proper selection of a bottom head will also make a substantial difference in the sound of the drum. A thinner head is usually more desirable because it will offer you more flexibility in the overall range of tuning for the drum. However, depending on the sound you are trying to achieve, a thicker head may be better. The only way to accurately evaluate the true sound of the drum you are checking out is to try it with a couple of different heads and choose them based on the type of sound you are trying to get.

Shells
So what to look for in the shell? Lets start with the actual type of wood the shell is made of. There are certainly going to be exceptions to any of these examples but this guide to wood types should provide you with a decent springboard in your search for new drums. Since the majority of consumer level drum kits are fabricated with either maple or birch shells, we will concentrate on these two wood types the most. We will also talk about combination plies as well.
It seems these days that there is a real push toward owning maple drums. In my experience working in a drum shop, people usually do not understand the sound characteristics of the types of wood shells they claim sound better. This is true not of just entry level players, but seasoned veterans as well. This said, it is important to understand the tonal difference between the different types of woods used to construct the shells before making a purchase decision.
Generally speaking, a birch drum shell is going to give the drum a livelier sound. Birch tends to be louder than a maple shell. Some of the more popular drums using birch shells are the Yamaha Recording Custom and the Premier Genista series. This is not to say that there are not a plethora of other companies making fine birch drums. Because the birch shells have a tendency to be very loud, they are little tougher to tune because of their volume and projection. If you are playing in a situation where a lot of volume is required or you want to get that deep cannon sound, a birch kit would be a good choice with some dual ply heads on it. If this is not the overall tonal characteristics you are looking for then you should consider a maple drum. A maple shell usually produces a warmer, darker sounding drum. It will tend to be a little more controlled and less lively. You will find the volume to be not as significant. Most players usually find that a maple drum is easier to tune.
There are other things you need to consider about the shells you choose in addition to the wood. Many companies are now making very thin (4-5 plies and less) maple drums. The thickness of the shell will have a huge impact on the amount of reverberation the drum produces. For example, the thin shell of the Peavey drums will be much more lively than the thick shell of the Yamaha Studio Customs. I spoke with Bobby Rock after a clinic one evening and I asked him if it was difficult to tune the Peaveys because of their extremely thin shells. He said that controlling the reverberation of the drums was a bit tricky, but that once the drums were tuned sympathetically with one another, that he could not imagine a better drum sound. His drums were very loud and powerful, and they sounded terrific. But I have also heard Peavey drums that sounded just awful. Did one set have a better shell than the other? No, it was simply a matter of head choice and tuning ability. Like the Peavey drums, a very popular trend among drum companies today is the choice of maple as the wood, but using very thin shells to increase the projection of the drums. The result they claim, and I agree, is a drum with the warmth that a maple drum provides but with some of the tonal characteristics like volume and projection that Birch tends to add. Another good example with this type of shell is the Premier Signias.
There are other woods being used in the fabrication of drum shells these days. One type that Premier is using is Eucalyptus wood. Tim Wilson from Premier told us that Eucalyptus has some very interesting characteristics. For one thing, it tends to mimic the wood that it is matched up with. And its resonation factor is within mils of that of a birch shell. Another plus in the manufacturing of Eucalyptus is the fact that is very pliable, so thicker plies can be used. Premier uses Eucalyptus in their affordable XPK drumkit line. The outer two and inner two plies are birch, while the inner two plies are eucalyptus. The APK uses 4 plies of eucalyptus on the inside and two plies of mahogany on the outside. I have sold and tuned a number of APK and XPK drum kits and found them to be of exceptional quality for the dollar. Another wood being used for shells today is rosewood. Rosewood tends to be very dark and dense, even more so than maple. I should also mention that mahogany is a popular choice for lower priced kits because of its affordability. Its sound tends to be more along the lines of a birch drum, very lively.
Another very popular concept in drum shell construction these days is the tuning or matching of the drum shells. This process is achieved in many different ways. It typically involves some sort of tonal matching for intervals between the different drums to be put together in a set. I spoke with Julie Christine from DW and she explained the process to me. When an order for a kit is placed, the shells are picked out to fit that particular order and the pitches are matched so that the intervals between each shell, minus the hardware, are optimal. This is done by holding the shell with one finger to minimize the contact with the wood and each shell is then tapped to determine its pitch. This is done with as many shells as necessary to find the perfect set of matching shells. After the hardware is placed on the shell the drum is again tapped using the same procedure and then the note that the drum is tuned to is placed inside the shell.
Each drum seems to have a perfect pitch at which it seems to resonate and sound nicest. Should you take the time to tune your drums in such a way that optimizes them for that "perfect pitch", then the process that companies like DW are taking to give the player a shell pack with such optimally tuned intervals will be very beneficial to you. This will also decrease your tuning headaches. Most players will realistically, never take the time to develop the ability to tune drums with such exacting precision.

Cymbals
Cymbals are a major part of what a player invests into a drumkit. I had one reader tell me that a drumset was not so much a drumkit as it was a cymbal kit. That may be stretching it a bit, but there is truth in that remark. Cymbals form an integral part of the players sound, and when purchasing them care should be taken to get the correct set for the type of music and sound you are trying to achieve.
There are a lot of different types of cymbals out there to choose from. So many in fact, that it would very difficult to cover them all in one article. I will give you an over view of your options, but ultimately when buying cymbals, unlike buying improperly tuned drums, what you hear is what you get. So your own taste, musically, will be the greatest test in your selection. Cymbals that sound wonderful to one drummer may sound awful to another.
The pitch and response of a cymbal are determined by its weight. Lightweight cymbals will have more of a shimmering sound and less of a distinct ping when struck. They will crescendo quickly and decay quickly as well. Heavy cymbals have a more distinct ping when struck and much lower overtones and take longer to reach their peak volume. When picking out a ride cymbal consider the bell size as well. The bell of the cymbal is the raised part that surrounds the center of the cymbal. A larger bell will deliver a louder and more cutting note when struck. It will also have a lower fundamental pitch and overtones. A smaller bell will be less distinct and higher in pitch.
Entry level cymbals have improved incredibly over the last few years. When I was young, entry level cymbals meant something that was warped and bent after one healthy playing session. Now, new players who want to keep the dollar amount down have some nice choices to select from. Sabians B8 series is constructed of 92% copper and 8% tin. The cymbal really does sound excellent for the money and would not be a bad choice for a starter player. By way of comparison however, Sabian’s AA series cymbals are 80% copper and contain 20% tin with traces of silver. The sound is much cleaner and musical. Zildjian’s own entry level cymbals are created from sheet bronze and also offer a great value for the dollar. Zildjian’s most popular cymbals are made from a cast bronze and are what the ever popular A’s, K’s and K Customs are created from. Paiste also recently developed a new line of entry level cymbals which are very musical sounding.
Another factor to consider when you are actually out shopping is the environment. It can be very difficult and frustrating to pick out a cymbal among dozens or hundreds of others. Often it is nearly impossible to ascertain the compatibility of the cymbal to your own drums without actually hearing them on the set. Many drum shops will allow you to exchange the cymbals within a couple of days. The ability to exchange cymbals at a store is huge plus considering the costs involved.
Pricing among the cymbals mentioned will range in retail price from around $80-$400. Most drum shops will offer discounts when buying.
Any company that sells drums or cymbals will usually be very glad to speak with potential customers. The companies know their product better than anyone else and they can provide valuable information and very detailed specs about the piece. They will be very willing to provide literature. So do not be afraid to call them. Do your homework and good Luck!