The development of the drum set is largely rooted in American tradition and music, and therefore most of what are considered vintage and classic drum sets were made by American companies. Some of the famous early drum set makers include Slingerland, Leedy, Ludwig, Rogers, and Gretsch. Naturally, the Zildjian cymbals we recognize today carry the […]

The development of the drum set is largely rooted in American tradition and music, and therefore most of what are considered vintage and classic drum sets were made by American companies. Some of the famous early drum set makers include Slingerland, Leedy, Ludwig, Rogers, and Gretsch. Naturally, the vintage drums we recognize today carry the […]

The Sonor drums factory was expropriated by the communist East German government in 1950. The Sonor company was founded by Johannes Link, who in 1875 built a factory for manufacturing percussion instruments and drum-heads in Weissenfels, Bavaria (in Germany). Link, born in 1847, spent his early career in wood and leather works. The first Sonor […]

The snare drum is the center piece of the modern drum kit. Snare drums are made of a wooden or metal shell and are double headed. The snare drum’s batter head is stretched across the drum’s top and is the part struck with the stick when the drum is played. The snare drum’s snare head […]

Slingerland’s legendary Radio King drum sets introduced the first double-headed tunable tom tom. The Slingerland company was started by Henry H. Slingerland in Chicago in 1916. As a fast emerging company, Slingerland took up drummer Gene Krupa’s request for a cutting edge drum set with tunable resonant heads on the tom toms’ bottoms. The result […]

Rogers drums were the first to feature memory lock clamps for easy setup duplication. The Rogers company was started in 1849 by an Irish immigrant from Dublin named Joseph Rogers. Rogers came to the United States and started crafting drum-heads. Rogers began making drums in the mid 1930s from a Farmingdale, New Jersey location. The […]

The Roland company does not make traditional drums, but rather all of the Roland drums are electronic. Roland is a pioneer and world leader in electronic musical instruments and products. Its array of products includes synthesizers, drum machines, mixing boards, effect processors, and of course electronic drum sets. Named for the French epic poem, Le […]

Remo was the first to commercially manufacture synthetic drumheads. Remo is probably best known for its Remo drumheads, but in the mid 1980s it also became a successful manufacturer of drums as well. In 1957, Remo Belli, in collaboration with a chemist named Sam Muchnick, introduced the first commercial synthetic drumhead, hence starting Remo’s domination […]

Premier drums are made by the by the British Premier Drums Company. The Premier company was started in 1922 by Albret Della-Porta, who was 20 years old at the time. Della-Porta was a London drummer who had played on Boyle drums. And after Charlie Boyle, the owner of the Bolye drum company, was killed in […]

Peavey Drums are made by the Massachusetts based Peavey Company, which is better known for its amplifiers and electronic instruments. Peavey introduced its first line of conventional drums at the NAMM music products trade show in 1984. These drums never made it into production and Peavey finally started selling drums a decade later. What makes […]