Happy Birthday Stan

Tambourine Shell Repair

A broken tambourine shell usually means that a new tambourine purchase is necessary. This can be exciting: I like getting new instruments, or sad: Any instrument that is damaged is a terrible thing. All tambourine shells can break, from my famous $14 variety to top of the line brands like Grover and Black Swamp. It's easy to replace a tambourine head but broken shells/missing pins and jingles usually means an early grave for the instrument. My early attempts at these repairs were stopgap measures until a new one was found. Wood or 'super' glue used on the shell turned out to be poor choices. It wasn't until last year that I really focused on shell repair. It happened during a Canyon Winds rehearsal when one of our tambourines exploded, pins and jingles were flying everywhere. Yep, it was the Resident Gorilla playing it. The shell had cracked between three sets of jingles near the head of the tambourine. We eventually replaced this with a Black Swamp tambourine but I s...

The Practice Pad

The practice pad has long been a staple for the drummer. After a pair of sticks it usually was the next thing purchased. Or in the case for my brother and I, a DIY project by our father. It could be as simple as a square of linoleum nailed on a board to the double sided models that produce various amounts of rebound. There are many reasons for using a practice pad. I'll start with the obvious: Practical: Compared to a real drum, they are cheap. They are fairly quiet, you can play them without annoying a sleeping parent or a neighbor in an adjoining apartment. They are portable, they can be taken on a family vacation where space is at a premium. Musical: Usually they provide more rebound than a drum head, which helps in developing single strokes but especially rolls. Articulation: The sound of each stroke is cleaner giving the player important feedback on the precision of their playing. Developing positional accuracy: Drawing a circle the size of a quarter on the pad provides a ...

Muffet is gone

Sadly she just curled and died. One day she was on her web and the next she was on the window sill. She got rid of a massive amount of flying nasties in her life time, but she also provided a lot of education for us. Filling the coffee pot, washing dishes, or just sitting in the kitchen we would always look for her in the different areas of her web. I think I'll put an ad on our 'Neighborhood' app. Position open: Fly exterminator provide your own web must not bite.

A Percussionist's Notebook

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