Conclusion

In explaining his move away from radio-oriented pop music, songwriter Nick Lowe once recalled in an interview that he had successfully escaped from ‘the tyranny of the snare drum’. This comment resonated with some musicians presumably because it expressed an uneasiness regarding the drum kit’s slow and steady ascent in the aesthetics of record mixes. The drummer’s status has arguably shifted over history from a position of conspicuous absence and ‘hanging around with musicians’ to a position of ‘tyranny’ where the freedom of contemporary commercial songwriting is restricted through a conservative reliance on a 4/4 beat, rigidly enforced by a regime of kick and snare. This chapter discusses area for future research on the drum kit.

Working drummers, musical labour, role playing, and authorship

This chapter examines drumming as a form of musical labour. It documents the establishment of different roles the drummer is expected to play in different contexts, from session work in the recording studio to the work performed by rock stars onstage. It also considers the globalization of drum kit production in the postwar era and the rise of East Asian manufacturers such as Pearl, Tama, and Yamaha. Finally, it considers the plight of the drummer when it comes to receiving credit as a songwriter, and how the history of copyright law has influenced the perception of drummers and the remuneration they can expect for their work.

Introduction

This chapter explains the motivations for researching the social history of the drum kit. It traces the history of drummer jokes and outlines the structure of the chapters to follow. Chapter 1 traces the racist roots of linking drummers to primitive stereotypes and contrasts this against the cleverness of drummers that culminated in the invention of the drum. Chapter 2 shows how drummers in fact contributed to redefining the boundaries between noise and music. Chapter 3 reveals how drummers developed new conventions of literacy while standardizing both the components and performance practice of their instrument. Chapter 4 examines the development of the status of drummers as creative artists. Chapter 5 looks at drumming as a form of musical labour. Chapter 6 considers attempts to replace the drum kit and drummers with new technologies, and how such efforts ultimately underscored the centrality of the drum kit as part of the contemporary soundscape.

Indispensable drummers, drum machines, and record production

This chapter explores attempts to replace drummers with new technologies, but also the gradual move of the drum kit—both acoustic and synthesized—from the margins to the center of pop record production from the 1970s to the present. It examines the development of recording the drum kit through the multi-tracking era and into the digital production era. It also discusses the important role the drum kit played in the creation of reggae, Afrobeat, hip-hop, disco, and dance music. It charts the rise of drum machines, digital samplers, augmenting the drum kit, and drumming without drummers.

Studious drummers, selling drum outfits, standardization, and stardom

Literacy, education, and standardization were key steps forward in consolidating the drum kit’s legitimacy in the 1930s. This chapter examines the biographies of many early drummers and how they learnt to play the drum kit. Arguments over how to play the drum kit were inseparable from the changing form of the drum kit itself, as manufacturers like Ludwig, Slingerland, Leedy, and Gretsch competed to sell standardized, pre-bundled drum kits in their catalogues rather than the hodge-podge, self-assembled drum kits of the past. This chapter discusses the creation of an international market for drum kits through a combination of instrument innovation, education, and old-fashioned hucksterism. Drum manufacturers created their own newsletters as a way of convincing drummers to buy their product. The chapter also examines the career of swing era drummer Gene Krupa, comparing him with African-American drummer Chick Webb, an influential but less well known drumming bandleader.

Noisy drummers, ragtime, jazz, and the avant-garde

This chapter examines the early drum kit and how it challenged preconceptions about the relationship between noise and music. First, it explores the development of ragtime music. Second, it examines the negative impact of the early music scholarship on the status of the drum kit and drummers. Third, it discusses the profession of trap drummers and their role in performing sound effects for silent film. Fourth, it discusses the challenges facing women who wished to become professional drummers, the association between percussive noise and immigrant cultures, the influence of Chinese instruments on the early drum kit, and the origins of Tin Pan Alley. Fifth, it examines the role of the drum kit in the birth of jazz. Sixth, it explores the drum kit and drummers in 1920s recording studios. Finally, it examines the influence of the drum kit and other percussion instruments in classical music.

Creative drummers, artistry, virtuosity, and playing time

This chapter explores the drummer as a creative artist versus their role as an accompanist and timekeeper. This chapter picks up in the late 1930s, when star drummers like Buddy Rich set new standards for virtuosity on the drum kit, and drum battles became popular displays of technical skill and showmanship. It also discusses the ‘all-girl’ swing bands of the 1930s and 1940s, focusing on the case of drummer Viola Smith. The chapter describes the increasingly prominent role of the drummer in the new bebop style of the 1940s, focusing on two of the drum kit’s greatest musical innovators, Kenny ‘Klook’ Clarke and Max Roach. It also traces the origins of the ‘four-on-the-floor’ pulse of the bass drum and backbeat on two and four of the snare drum that came to dominate dance music through the twentieth century to the present day. The chapter concludes with the drum kit’s second global superstar after Gene Krupa: Ringo Starr of the Beatles.

Clever drummers, primitivism, entrepreneurialism, and the invention of the trap drummer’s outfit

This chapter documents the prehistory of drum kit performance practice and the invention of the trap drummer’s outfit. First, it examines the impact of the transatlantic slave trade on American musical culture. Second, it explores the history of the snare drum, bass drum, and cymbals, and how they come together in ensemble performance. Third, it discusses the emergence of highbrow and lowbrow culture and the consequences for the status of drummers. Fourth, it discusses the types of music that a drummer was likely to play working in nineteenth-century USA. Fifth, it examines the tinkerers, inventors, and entrepreneurs who developed the key components of the early drum kit, known in its time as the ‘trap drummer’s outfit’.