Future of Drums and Drumming.

BattleArmor

Silver Member
Hey guys.

Today I was thinking. Do any of you think that eventually acoustic drums will be outdated? As in, electronic drums will be the norm through out the drumming community.

And do you think even farther than that, that we drummers will be replaced by the ever growing technological advances in music?
 
Over twenty years ago there was concern that Moog and other electronic keyboards were going to replace most musicians and piano players especially. It hasn't happened and I don't think it will. Concerts are still selling out and I can't see an arena full of people listening to sampled music coming from one keyboard on the stage. The technology has changed the way music is recorded but I don't see it taking over completely.
 
People predicted in the 80s that acoustic drums were on the way out, and that didn't happen.

In the long run, who knows? It's easy to say "never!" but if you think about it, drum kits have only been an instrument for a little over 100 years, and was invented to play the early forms of jazz. Drum kits have since evolved over to time to play rock and metal.

So it's impossible to say what will happen 100 years from now. We could eventually have a new form of music that doesn't use drum kits. Or we could have a new form of music that has the drum kit evolve in ways no one as currently thought of.

However, much like people still like to play classical pieces from 100's of years ago, I would suspect jazz and rock would continue as least historical music for some time if/when it gets replaced.

But I don't think drum kits are going out of style any time soon.
 
Hey guys.

Today I was thinking. Do any of you think that eventually acoustic drums will be outdated? As in, electronic drums will be the norm through out the drumming community.

And do you think even farther than that, that we drummers will be replaced by the ever growing technological advances in music?

Why don't you tell us what you think the future of drumming and drums will be?
 
As the saying goes, the 3 things yo can be sure of is death, taxes, and change.

Drums have changed & will keep changing. We've come a long way from calfskins, woodblocks, and Lo-Hats..

On a practical scale, electronic drums have already replaced the real thing. A long time ago, as a matter of fact.

I would guess that 90% of recorded music today has electronically generated drums, or drum parts.

Drummers, to some extent are already obsolete. Sad, but true. We could argue the the natural organic feel of a real drummer cooking real music is a much richer musical experience than all the programmed drum loops, but then we would be in a minority.

The music business does not believe in minorities
 
As the saying goes, the 3 things yo can be sure of is death, taxes, and change.

Drums have changed & will keep changing. We've come a long way from calfskins, woodblocks, and Lo-Hats..

On a practical scale, electronic drums have already replaced the real thing. A long time ago, as a matter of fact.

I would guess that 90% of recorded music today has electronically generated drums, or drum parts.

Drummers, to some extent are already obsolete. Sad, but true. We could argue the the natural organic feel of a real drummer cooking real music is a much richer musical experience than all the programmed drum loops, but then we would be in a minority.

The music business does not believe in minorities

Very true, most mass produced music has artificial drums and audiences don't seem to mind much one way or the other.

At the same time, the "traditional" way of producing and distributing music - record labels - is also becoming fast obsolete. I think this will re-open mass-produced music to human drummers and other human musicians.
 
As the saying goes, the 3 things yo can be sure of is death, taxes, and change.

Drums have changed & will keep changing. We've come a long way from calfskins, woodblocks, and Lo-Hats..

On a practical scale, electronic drums have already replaced the real thing. A long time ago, as a matter of fact.

I would guess that 90% of recorded music today has electronically generated drums, or drum parts.

Drummers, to some extent are already obsolete. Sad, but true. We could argue the the natural organic feel of a real drummer cooking real music is a much richer musical experience than all the programmed drum loops, but then we would be in a minority.

The music business does not believe in minorities

What is funny/sad is how many young drummers can play like a drum machine, because that's what they know. I'm not knocking it, it's just an observation.

You do make a good point though, so much music is already electronic, and even what is played by a real person is triggering sampled sounds, and/or the tracks are emailed from the drummers house.
 
Hey guys.
that we drummers will be replaced by the ever growing technological advances in music?

An interesting topic to think about.
If Society and/or Technology decides to replace Humanes for Machines, they are making a big failure. The difference is that us (drummers) have the groove, feeling, emotion, spirit, inspiration, passion...The question is: Machines, technology have these?
 
An interesting topic to think about.
If Society and/or Technology decides to replace Humanes for Machines, they are making a big failure. The difference is that us (drummers) have the groove, feeling, emotion, spirit, inspiration, passion...The question is: Machines, technology have these?

I've heard some tracks with Drums on Demand that have an astounding amount of groove, feeling, emotion, spirit, inspiration and passion. A human - maybe someone who had never sat behind a set - programmed the sounds and the computer rendered them. As machines become more advanced, they are able to do more and more of the things humans used to be needed for, especially the technical rendering aspect. A human will always be needed for creative purposes, but if a non-drummer uses a computer to create astounding drum parts, where does that leave the real drummer?
 
Okay, heres the one singularly unique thing about drummers.

We are the only ones that use all 4 limbs to create a single piece of music.

This has been replaced by two fingers on a keyboard or a touchpad.

I think it will be tragic if this 4 limbed multi timbral expertise is lost in future, because it could really have some interesting applications in a Starwars type scenario.
 
...hmmmm.

If you go to the "your gear" section on this board and look at let's say a dozen, one hundred, or even a thousand random kits, how many would be identical ?

Each drum kit on this board is as individual as the drummer who plays it. Considering this is only a small fraction of the drumming world as a whole, I would seriously doubt that the cookie cutter technology of electronic drums will ever replace the individuality, and self expression that acoustic drums provide.

Besides, electronic drums are the tool of the devil.

Barry
 
Why don't you tell us what you think the future of drumming and drums will be?

Personally, I think that in recording, and live situations, electronic drums could take over acoustic drums. But I think that acoustic ones will still be made for a long time.

As far as drummers becoming obselete I agree with aydee.

"Drummers, to some extent are already obsolete. Sad, but true. We could argue the the natural organic feel of a real drummer cooking real music is a much richer musical experience than all the programmed drum loops, but then we would be in a minority."


Tis a true statement.
 
As the saying goes, the 3 things yo can be sure of is death, taxes, and change.

Drums have changed & will keep changing. We've come a long way from calfskins, woodblocks, and Lo-Hats..

On a practical scale, electronic drums have already replaced the real thing. A long time ago, as a matter of fact.

I would guess that 90% of recorded music today has electronically generated drums, or drum parts.

Drummers, to some extent are already obsolete. Sad, but true. We could argue the the natural organic feel of a real drummer cooking real music is a much richer musical experience than all the programmed drum loops, but then we would be in a minority.

The music business does not believe in minorities
Although a lot, maybe most of the pop music world uses programmed drum loops to create a RECORDING, they still use live drummers on tour, because who wants to go to a concert, and just hear recorded tracks? You might as well stay home and listen to the CD.

And one more point: In the 80's, a lot of drum tracks were programmed with drum machines, and or sequencers, but they were mostly programmed by real drummers, who thought they would be out of a job if they didn't learn programming.
Now, most drum loops are actual drums, recorded by real drummers, so you can buy them and have Bernard Purdie (for example) on your home recordings.
My point: Drummers will always have jobs. Also certain genres of music, such as jazz, can never be programmed, or looped, because there is so much improv, and interpretation, that needs live drumming to be able to react to the other musicians in the band, and that is not possible with canned drum tracks. I just don't see us being replaced completely, in our lifetime anyway.
 
Although a lot, maybe most of the pop music world uses programmed drum loops to create a RECORDING, they still use live drummers on tour, because who wants to go to a concert, and just hear recorded tracks? You might as well stay home and listen to the CD.

Usher, Britney, Madonna and other pop gods and goddesses that account for the major chunk of music sold, use sequencers, triggers, and other computer based devices on stage, IN ADDITION to having a live drummer.

And one more point: In the 80's, a lot of drum tracks were programmed with drum machines, and or sequencers, but they were mostly programmed by real drummers, who thought they would be out of a job if they didn't learn programming.

Drum programming has become a lot easier since. Cutting, editing, creating loops can be done by people who can operate a mouse or a touch-pad.


My point: Drummers will always have jobs. Also certain genres of music, such as jazz, can never be programmed, or looped, because there is so much improv, and interpretation, that needs live drumming to be able to react to the other musicians in the band, and that is not possible with canned drum tracks. I just don't see us being replaced completely, in our lifetime anyway.

Drummers will have jobs, but I'm not quite sure what jobs...; ). Yes, jazz is difficult to programme but its is a insignificant stream of the music business.

I agree with the bit that there will always be some cats wanting to bang away on stuff which will then get a bunch of people all excited and want to jump up & dance n stuff..
 
Electronic drums are improving tremendously. As population densities create larger cities and closer living spaces, more drummers will have to switch to the e-kit, lest they be beaten by their neighbors. We have 6.8 billion people here now, by 2040, they predict 9 billion. But you can imagine the mesh head and the e-kit cymbal will be greatly improved, over the next 30 years. Beginner and intermediate acoustic kits will get less popular and/or available from manufactures. The market will be flooded with "used drums". More drummers added to the already shrinking "working" market, just means more amateurs and hobbyists, either playing "vintage kits", used pro-level kits, or brand new pro level kits.
 
Electronic drumming will not replace acoustic... do we not have grand pianos or acoustic guitars anymore? Of course not! The drummer will only be obsolete when every listener in the world would rather hear a metronome in songs than a human.
 
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