Stupid tight marching drum tuning

Larry

Larry

"Uncle Larry"
Went to my very first pro football game this past weekend if you can believe that. On my way to the stadium, in the parking lot, they had guys playing bass drums, guys playing those over the shoulder mounted quad concert tom things, and other guys playing those deep Yamaha high tension snare drums. They were probably Kevlar heads, they sure sounded like them, but I really didn't look that closely. As I was walking by listening to them play, I couldn't help noticing how tightly cranked up the snare drum heads were. There was no shell involvement, just a choked head and IMO they got the worst possible sound from that drum. Now I like a tight snare believe me, but all marching guys choke their drums. I would love to see a slo mo vid of one of those high tension marching snare heads being struck, compared to a snarehead that is tuned below choking. I'm thinking the cranked head won't be moving nearly as much.

Anyway, my thought/questions are:

Why TF do they tighten the marching snares to rediculousness?

They never used to tune those drums that tight. But I have been hearing them tight for quite some time now, well over a decade I would imagine. When did the choked marching snare sound trend take over and why? I think they sound just plain bad tuned that tight. A shell-less drum, like a rototom, would make the same sound tuned that tight. I got a close up opportunity to hear them and all I could hear was drumhead, no shell. And that was a substantial shell, 14 x 10 at least. It would have sounded so much better tuned in it's range.

Anybody with me in thinking marching snares sound choked? I'm not liking it either.
Anybody agree that it would sound 1000 times better tuned down some?
 
It'll have something to do with 'increasing projection' I'm sure.

I agree though, it does seem pointless to have a large drum and to actually not use the material of the shell at all.
 
To max out the rebound, I suppose.

I can't stand the sound of the american drum corps-style marching drums either. The sound is just not pleasing at all.
 
mediocrefunkybeat said:
It'll have something to do with 'increasing projection' I'm sure.
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I thought that it was exactly the opposite. They weren't loud at all. Yes they made sound, and you could hear the snares a little, but I didn't think it carried well at all. 20 feet away it just sounded like tapping on something that wasn't a drum. That's not good projection in my book. I will say that you do notice the sound, because it's it so high, but with a crap tone. I don't see how negligible shell involvement could be good for projection. I thought the sound was weak and anemic, very unsatisfying, and completely devoid of any real drum tone. They are doing the worst possible thing to their tone and why, I just can't understand.

If I led a marching band I wouldn't stand for that tone, even though every other band does it.

As far as the rebound thing...I get plenty of rebound from my non choked snare. There is more than enough rebound there for anything you need to do.
 
I grew up playing in marching bands and drum corps through the 80s and yes, there has been this evolution to the tighter snare drum. In the 80s, at least then snares still sounded like snares. The head of choice was a Remo Pinstripe and they used gut snares. When the late 80s hit, everybody jumped on this kevlar thing and I agree, it's gotten ridiculous.

But the reasoning I gleaned from all this was that when you have a row of ten snare drummers, you want the strokes to be clean. Can't really do that if the drum sounds phat. You wouldn't be able to discern what the line is playing.

In my current gig at Disney I have a snare line of six marching in front, and they definitely get the cleanliness and the projection, but even I get a thicker backbeat with a regular snare tuned down compared to theirs.

The modern drum line now seems to be the descendant of Scottish bag pipe drumming, which really started the high-and-tight craze. But the Scottish guys even had snares under the top head. When you look at the tradition of the Scottish bag pipers, and there are still alot of those groups in Chicago (the home of Ludwig and Slingerland, get it?) you can probably see the influence!

If you ever checked out one of those European Tattoo festivals (where military drum corps get together to compete) you'll see the evolution of the bag pipes to modern times. There's a huge rudimental drumming tradition worldwide. What surprises me is how our own U.S. Old Guard hasn't really influenced anyone on the tuning, because they use old-style colonial drums with calf heads, tuned down, but sound so cool and musical.
 
larryace said:
Why TF do they tighten the marching snares to rediculousness?
Click to expand...

Because of acoustics.

Recently World Championships have been held at Lucas Oil Stadium in Texas, and that's a pretty big venue. Imagine playing acoustically in a place that big. You need every single bit of help you can get to project a certain sound to the audience which would be hundreds upon hundreds of feet away and upwards from the players, not to mention the pressbox which would be where a lot of the judging is going on.

When it comes to shell and snare sound, like all drums, you can still tune marching drums badly. A badly tuned snare would be extremely dry, almost as if there is no sound coming from the shell of snares, and that might be what you encountered, Larry. A well-tuned marching snare would be relatively wet. The shell of a snare does come into play, but as with all drums, the wood selection does very little to noticeably change the sound. Mostly the difference is in weight and size of the shell. So, on top of the need for projection from tuning, you also need projection from the make of the drum.

If a snare-line was tuned too low, two things would happen primarily:

1. It wouldn't really reach the audience as well during performances. It's hard enough to get through an 80-man hornline.

2. They wouldn't be nearly as clean. A snareline is the easiest section of the line to clean because it's almost entirely attack, and pushing 9 precisely defined points of attack onto one pinpoint of time is much more easy than trying to do it with snares that have a measurable amount of sustain.

So, everything that is done by a marching snare line is to produce a sound that is more suitable for the environment it plays in.

Now, if the tenors sounded choked, that's the fault of the players.

Hope that answered your questions.
 
I have not liked that sound in a long time. I live within earshot of one of the best marching bands in the country. 7th in the nation last year or the year before and I can hear the band from my house when I am outside and they are practicing. I hate that sound as well. I remember when drums had real animal heads and made some noise. I also remember hearing a bag and drum group when I was in Europe in the 70's. I think it may have started there. Just a guess. But then again, I don't think marching bands march any more. They use what I call the sissy step slide and never lift there legs to move. I would love to hear them go back to the loose drum sound that does carry sound and actually march. A second thought if anyone remembers the funeral for JFK, they used larged muffled snare drums and that sound was low but carried forever. Lower sound carry farther than high sounds and that is why I hear bass drum from my house and not snare drums. Cleaner sound yes, project more, I would argue that. Go to Youtube and look for JFK funeral and see what a real snare drum sounds like. My opinion.
 
Was it an eagles game, larry? Did you see Vick throw that TD after ducking under four guys?! Kevlar is an awful sound I agree.
 
larryace said:
Went to my very first pro football game this past weekend if you can believe that. On my way to the stadium, in the parking lot, they had guys playing bass drums, guys playing those over the shoulder mounted quad concert tom things, and other guys playing those deep Yamaha high tension snare drums. They were probably Kevlar heads, they sure sounded like them, but I really didn't look that closely. As I was walking by listening to them play, I couldn't help noticing how tightly cranked up the snare drum heads were. There was no shell involvement, just a choked head and IMO they got the worst possible sound from that drum. Now I like a tight snare believe me, but all marching guys choke their drums. I would love to see a slo mo vid of one of those high tension marching snare heads being struck, compared to a snarehead that is tuned below choking. I'm thinking the cranked head won't be moving nearly as much.

Anyway, my thought/questions are:

Why TF do they tighten the marching snares to rediculousness?

They never used to tune those drums that tight. But I have been hearing them tight for quite some time now, well over a decade I would imagine. When did the choked marching snare sound trend take over and why? I think they sound just plain bad tuned that tight. A shell-less drum, like a rototom, would make the same sound tuned that tight. I got a close up opportunity to hear them and all I could hear was drumhead, no shell. And that was a substantial shell, 14 x 10 at least. It would have sounded so much better tuned in it's range.

Anybody with me in thinking marching snares sound choked? I'm not liking it either.
Anybody agree that it would sound 1000 times better tuned down some?
Click to expand...

It's all about the cleanliness man! Imagine this, you tune all those drums down. Wetten and Fatten them up. They sound good right? Until you put 8 or more of them end to end and get them to play a figure with a bunch of rolls in it. Then it will sound like raining cats on a tin roof, or gravel pouring out of a dump truck. They tune them up like that so it sounds clean across the snare line. They actually do cut pretty well regardless of the decreased projection. When I was marching, you'd see everyone with scoops on the bottoms of the snares to help them project better. I haven't seen it as much recently, though.

As far as I know, the tightening trend began in the 90's and peaked probably when I was marching (97-2000). We used to strip lugs and break tension rods like crazy, especially in the cold because the tone would get deeper and the battery instructor would just crank the piss out of the drums to try to get the pitch back up. Let me tell you, when one of those woven kevlar heads pops, it'll scare the you know what out of you too!

I think the trend is starting to go back towards looser snares again, though.
 
IDK I would bet money that if I was in a stadium with a choked kevlar deep marching snare drum and a non choked 14 x 6.5 snare drum, tuned tight and poppy, with nice tight snare wires, that the non choked drum would sound, crisper, fuller, louder.....better, plain and simple. I don't buy that you wouldn't be able to hear the non choked drum and that it doesn't project as well

I would further bet that if I had a line of snare drummers with the choked heads and a line of drummers with my choice of snare, that my line would sound better. If they want a crisp sound from multiple snare players, why then do they make them play deep shelled snares? Wouldn't a shallower shell sound be crisper?

So in my mind, their reasoning goes like this. We want a crisp snare sound from multiple players. Let's give them a deep shell which is a slower drum, but we'll tune the heads up so tight, that the heads will choke and the shell depth won't matter.

I'm sorry I feel they are going about it backwards. They should have shallower drums with 30 strand snares with tight tight resos and the 2 ply non kevlar batter tuned a little below the point of choke. THAT would give you a much improved tone.
 
Just for the record, I am not saying to tune them low, I never said that. Tune them high for sure. Just don't choke them. I agree low tuned snares wouldn't work, but think of Stewart Copeland's snare sound compared to a marching drum. Stewart's snare sound still sounds like a drum, where the marching snare sounds like someone is tapping on sheets of metal or something. If you had a line of drummers all playing snares tuned by Stewart, it's gonna sound clean. Nobody here likes the choked sound so far. I can't stand it and am calling for an end to it lol.

And yea Abe it was an Eagles game. Vick amazes me with the ability he has to escape multiple tackles. He makes ballsy passes too, right between defenders arms to his target. Philadelphia football fans are a piece of work. I had a drunk guy fall on me. He thanked the guy who somehow managed to grab his beer before it spilled on people, but he didn't say sorry or thank you to me for breaking his fall. What a hammer.

Hey question...when the non home football team gets announced in cities other than Phila, are they booed? And when each individual player is announced from the non home team, does the crowd say "SUCKS" after the players name is announced? I was embarrassed by this, how low class.
 
Coldhardsteel said:
A well-tuned marching snare would be relatively wet.
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IDK Steelie, every marching snare I've heard in the last 15 years...I cannot describe the sound as wet at all. Actually I would term them dry, choked, cut off, pingy, inferior.

Wet to me means long sustain, and frequencies in both the upper and lower registers, a satisfying tone. The opposite of todays marching drums.
How they manage to get that high of a sound from a snare drum that deep is stupid IMO. Why don't they go with piccolo snares if all they want is attack?
 
They sound terrible. I am a high school teaher, and some years I have helped out the band director during marching season. Most of the drum parts for marching have very little to do with the song or any musical consideration. Drum on!
 
larryace said:
IDK Steelie, every marching snare I've heard in the last 15 years...I cannot describe the sound as wet at all. Actually I would term them dry, choked, cut off, pingy, inferior.

Wet to me means long sustain, and frequencies in both the upper and lower registers, a satisfying tone. The opposite of todays marching drums.
How they manage to get that high of a sound from a snare drum that deep is stupid IMO. Why don't they go with piccolo snares if all they want is attack?
Click to expand...

The key word that Steel used is "relatively".
 
Be that as it is, I still hear zero wetness in today's marching snare drums.
 
As a former Drum Corps person who hasn't marched since the early 70s I'm with you Lar.
The modern snares are way too dry for my taste.
 
Pitch drops dramatically from a distance. It's much more pronounced with Quint Toms, but it happens with snares too. That being said length of the note is key. A marching snare should be abrupt. Whether or it's tuned really "stupid tight' or a little below choking point, it must be abrupt. The snare line would sound like total mud if they had super ring-y snares.

It's the exact same principle as going out in the house to listen to your kit. If you are right on top a marching snare (10'-30' away) it will sound choked, dead, lifeless. However get about one hundred plus feet away (where the crowd is) and that same drum has tone, a lower pitch, and plenty of articulation.

-Kyle
 
larryace said:
And yea Abe it was an Eagles game. Vick amazes me with the ability he has to escape multiple tackles. He makes ballsy passes too, right between defenders arms to his target. Philadelphia football fans are a piece of work. I had a drunk guy fall on me. He thanked the guy who somehow managed to grab his beer before it spilled on people, but he didn't say sorry or thank you to me for breaking his fall. What a hammer.

Hey question...when the non home football team gets announced in cities other than Phila, are they booed? And when each individual player is announced from the non home team, does the crowd say "SUCKS" after the players name is announced? I was embarrassed by this, how low class.
Click to expand...

I guess thats why he gets the big bucks.Yes, the opposition does get booed in NY and Washington quite the way you describe.

Sorry, dont mean to turn this into a football thread.. just that the Vick TD was amazing..

...
 
Yeah, it's a dismal trend. A lot of drum corps purists lament the direction things have gone in. The advent of Kevlar and the de-emphasis on actual technique in favor of showy stick tricks has made the extra bounce essential to good performances in a lot of the corps. They haven't all declined equally, but the standard of rudimental playing today is just not the same. It sounds awful, but it's easier to play with all that rebound.
 
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