Poll: What is your genre and bass drum size?

It is hard though for a lot of drummers to stick with one style. For me, I love playing different styles. I try to balance out several styles and be influenced by multiple styles. My usual style is more rock, and I am not a jazz drummer, but I try to play a decent amount of jazz and improve my jazz playing. I also absolutely love the blues and play that way sometimes. I think some drummers get burned out playing one style all of the time. This isn't a bad idea for a thread, but I think a lot of drummers now play two or more styles. I'm a little surprised though at the sizes. I would think more people play 24 or 26". It is interesting to see what people classify themselves as.
 
Mine is 28" bass drum
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Jazz ... if someone says they play both rock and jazz I assume that to mean "mostly rock with some jazz or jazzy pop". In my experience serious jazz players (who play full jazz gigs and are accepted as "cats" in jazz circles) generally consider jazz a full time effort and, if they play any rock to make ends meet, they wouldn't mention it in this context.

If you are an exception to this assumption and I've wrongfully lumped you into the rock bag, by all means be a squeaky wheel!

I'm sort of somewhere between genres at the moment. Started off as a hard hitting, matched grippin' rock drummer then with the help of much practice, lessons and changing musical tastes I became an old-timey,groove swingin', trad grippin', snare tilting drummer.

I don't really play jazz gigs yet because my jazz chops are in no way up to the level of hanging with the real jazz cats...yet. I concede to the category of Rock drummer for now, a swingin rock drummer though.

Ok, I've squeaked my piece.
 
Interesting that the range goes 6" in either direction from the median value. A 30" or 14" bass drum wouldn't be unimaginable but it seems like 22" is all the averages, if you round up the mean! There must be something about that size in particular.
 
Interesting that the range goes 6" in either direction from the median value. A 30" or 14" bass drum wouldn't be unimaginable but it seems like 22" is all the averages, if you round up the mean! There must be something about that size in particular.

I know pretty much jack shit about drum equipment compared to most on here.

I would have said the 'standard' bass drum size is a 22" just from the number of times I've seen 22" compared to any other.
 
I know pretty much jack shit about drum equipment compared to most on here.

I would have said the 'standard' bass drum size is a 22" just from the number of times I've seen 22" compared to any other.

The "standard" configuration offered by all the major brands across all their model lines is indeed in a 22" config.
 
Is 20" considered "fusion" or is that reserved for 18" and smaller ??

A 20" config is often labelled as "fusion" or "recording", alongside the 10", 12" and 14" toms instead of the "standard" config comprising 22" kick, 12", 13" and 16" toms.

18" bass drum config are generally labelled "jazz", with a typical 12" and 14" toms.




Sorry Grea, this has nothing to do with your survey, just a little detour in the world of marketing :)
 
A 20" config is often labelled as "fusion" or "recording", alongside the 10", 12" and 14" toms instead of the "standard" config comprising 22" kick, 12", 13" and 16" toms.

18" bass drum config are generally labelled "jazz", with a typical 12" and 14" toms.




Sorry Grea, this has nothing to do with your survey, just a little detour in the world of marketing :)


Depends on the manufacturer too. I think some also use a 20 in their kits classified as jazz. I've seen several sets with 24's called 'rock' too.
I'm not sure how helpful it is to classify sets by their sizes, other than to help people who self-identify with a specific genre.
 
BTW, where are the funksters? ... the Garibaldi and Chambers disciples? What about the fusioneers?

Jazz ... if someone says they play both rock and jazz I assume that to mean "mostly rock with some jazz or jazzy pop". In my experience serious jazz players (who play full jazz gigs and are accepted as "cats" in jazz circles) generally consider jazz a full time effort and, if they play any rock to make ends meet, they wouldn't mention it in this context.

If you are an exception to this assumption and I've wrongfully lumped you into the rock bag, by all means be a squeaky wheel!

Well a one-word or one-genre classification never tells the full story. My band has guitars and backbeats, but I don't just consider it "rock", and though that was what I went with for myself, I'm not a true rock drummer. We play a lot of 60's soul and funk, Bill Withers, The Meters, Curtis Mayfield -- alongside southern rock and jam band music like the Allman Brothers, Government Mule, Grateful Dead -- alongside funk/fusion like Jaco Pastorius or Erykah Badu -- alongside classic Blues like BB King and Robert Johnson.

In other words, working musicians can never fully squeeze themselves into one pigeonhole, and they shouldn't have to. I understand that in this instance it's necessary for statistical purposes but I like the idea of just taking the genre portion out of it all together. Buddy Rich or Daniel Glass would skew the jazz results to the big end if they had participated! In my opinion there is credence to "the band determines the bass drum", but I think you really can do anything with a 20". I really ought to order that 20 x 14 Saturn I've been holding off on...
 
22x20 for rock gigs
20x20 funk

I love the 20in depth!!
 
Well a one-word or one-genre classification never tells the full story. My band has guitars and backbeats, but I don't just consider it "rock", and though that was what I went with for myself, I'm not a true rock drummer. We play a lot of 60's soul and funk, Bill Withers, The Meters, Curtis Mayfield -- alongside southern rock and jam band music like the Allman Brothers, Government Mule, Grateful Dead -- alongside funk/fusion like Jaco Pastorius or Erykah Badu -- alongside classic Blues like BB King and Robert Johnson.

In other words, working musicians can never fully squeeze themselves into one pigeonhole, and they shouldn't have to. I understand that in this instance it's necessary for statistical purposes but I like the idea of just taking the genre portion out of it all together. Buddy Rich or Daniel Glass would skew the jazz results to the big end if they had participated! In my opinion there is credence to "the band determines the bass drum", but I think you really can do anything with a 20". I really ought to order that 20 x 14 Saturn I've been holding off on...


I agree with all this^^^^.
And would add that IMO, most of the sub-categories that were originally listed fall under the large umbrella of 'rock'.
And yes, NerfLad, getting that 20 x 14 Saturn bass sounds like a good idea.
 
The latest averages, nuttin' much changing now:

rock 22.7
jazz 18.0
metal 23.3
blues 19.3
lounge 17
experimental 22
world 20
all 21.9

Around 60 out of 73 of us play in, um, hard hitting genres.


I'm thinking a straight histogram would be more appropriate than a bell-line given that we're working with non-continuous variables, Grea!

/Nitpick

Now this really is turning into my old job...

Nice pick, Duncan :) Theoretically, the line chart is used to describe time periods (like the famous profit/loss charts you see in movies) but since we were talking about Bell Curves I felt it would describe things better than columns.



Interesting that the range goes 6" in either direction from the median value. A 30" or 14" bass drum wouldn't be unimaginable but it seems like 22" is all the averages, if you round up the mean! There must be something about that size in particular.

Good point, Ben. There are a few converted 14" floor tom --> bass drums out there. More than 30" (I've not seen one in the flesh/wood before).

22 = mystical drummer number ;-)


Don't forget gender. And of course, hair length - short, medium, long and none. LOL

Sure thing! Male ave = 21.97, Female ave = 18

Hair length & colour ... does not compute. insufficient data. invalid parameter. beep.


Well a one-word or one-genre classification never tells the full story.

Agree entirely. 3D human beings cannot be reduced to 2D ciphers, not in any aspect of their being. But we make "for most practical means and purposes" assumptions for simplicity's sake.

Data analysis is really useful when it's treated as a guide rather than gospel truth. Makes me think of the parable of the the blind men who variously say that an elephant is like a tree trunk, a rope, a wall, spear, fan or snake.
 
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