I've recently purchased a late 50's/early 60's 16" x 20" Ludwig cocktail drum (the "Heinz Ketchup" logo). Pearl finish, cymbal mount, two other brackets, and a 10" single-headed drum. The original calfskin head of the 10" was destroyed, and I had to get a new hoop for it to replace it with a standard-size plastic head. I find that a 17" Sabian AA heavy crash makes a good crash-ride. I use one of the other mounts for a tambourine. I use a high-hat with 14" Ziljians (A on the top, ZBT on the bottom) alongside of it. My usual drum throne doesn't go high enough, but a bar stool is a comfortable height.
The bass drum sounds good, but the snare sounds awful! Brushes sound okay, but sticks or rods make it sound like a toy tin drum. According to the literature (Thank you for putting the catalogs on-line here), this is to be expected. Even as a tom, the upper head sounds bad: the baffle keeps it from playing deeply and I get a thin, unresonant sound. My thoughts include:
1) use a thinner head, like a Remo Diplomat or Renaissance.
2) get a 2nd fan snare
3) replace the fan snare with an up-from-the-bottom strainer snare, similar to what's used on some marching drums.
Your thoughts?
My old Ludwig Cocktail drum. Please help.
Re: My old Ludwig Cocktail drum. Please help.
Hi Robin,
Welcome to the forums!
Sounds like you've got a pretty nice drum there!
You are, of course, dealing with the hardest part of the all-in-one Cocktail Kit, the snare sound. There have been several discussions about snare sounds on the forum so a little searching might give you a lot of helpful info.
Generally I find the larger drums (15", 16") harder to get a more 'normal' snare sound than say a 14" drum. The baffle changes the sound quite a lot too.
I would always begin by trying different heads. Thinner heads definitely allow the snare to speak more and can sometimes make a drastic difference. Try the entire range of tuning as well. Every drums is different so a low pitch might work to fatten up your sound or a tight head might give you what you are looking for. On my 14" I crank the head about as high as it can go. It gives me a lighter snare response and sounds like a nice piccolo snare. If there is any way to easily reposition or remove the baffle, that would be worth experimenting with.
It is really important to find the sweet spots on the drum, especially the larger drums. Play the drum moving from the very edge to the very center of the head and see what works. I have yet to see a Cocktail Kit that you can play like a regular drum. You have to find the sounds! It might be a fairly small area and require you to be very accurate in your playing
Before doing any serious modifications to your drum (like drilling the shell, a big no-no for vintage drum collectors) Try making an external add-on snare to see if an extra snare will give you what you want. Check out Dinkus' add on snare here:
<img src="http://www.cocktaildrum.com/learn/const ... c01821.jpg">
(Look under the Construction section of the site)
If it works for you then you might consider installing it inside the drum.
I don't believe a standard snare bed would work very well under the top head. It would probably just choke the head. I think someone here tried it and wasn't very happy with the results.
Another option that some have tried is porting the drum. Drilling one or more 1-2" holes in the shell to allow air to escape. One of the problems with baffled drums is the head tends to choke more since there is nowhere for the air column inside the drum to go!
Hope this is helpful!
- John
Welcome to the forums!
Sounds like you've got a pretty nice drum there!
You are, of course, dealing with the hardest part of the all-in-one Cocktail Kit, the snare sound. There have been several discussions about snare sounds on the forum so a little searching might give you a lot of helpful info.
Generally I find the larger drums (15", 16") harder to get a more 'normal' snare sound than say a 14" drum. The baffle changes the sound quite a lot too.
I would always begin by trying different heads. Thinner heads definitely allow the snare to speak more and can sometimes make a drastic difference. Try the entire range of tuning as well. Every drums is different so a low pitch might work to fatten up your sound or a tight head might give you what you are looking for. On my 14" I crank the head about as high as it can go. It gives me a lighter snare response and sounds like a nice piccolo snare. If there is any way to easily reposition or remove the baffle, that would be worth experimenting with.
It is really important to find the sweet spots on the drum, especially the larger drums. Play the drum moving from the very edge to the very center of the head and see what works. I have yet to see a Cocktail Kit that you can play like a regular drum. You have to find the sounds! It might be a fairly small area and require you to be very accurate in your playing
Before doing any serious modifications to your drum (like drilling the shell, a big no-no for vintage drum collectors) Try making an external add-on snare to see if an extra snare will give you what you want. Check out Dinkus' add on snare here:
<img src="http://www.cocktaildrum.com/learn/const ... c01821.jpg">
(Look under the Construction section of the site)
If it works for you then you might consider installing it inside the drum.
I don't believe a standard snare bed would work very well under the top head. It would probably just choke the head. I think someone here tried it and wasn't very happy with the results.
Another option that some have tried is porting the drum. Drilling one or more 1-2" holes in the shell to allow air to escape. One of the problems with baffled drums is the head tends to choke more since there is nowhere for the air column inside the drum to go!
Hope this is helpful!
- John
Hi there. You might check out one of the many "microkits" and "boxtail" sets that Peter Lau has posted over time hereon. He's used everything you can think of to make snare drums souinds - and they seem to work pretty well.
On my cocktail drum I use two ends of a regular snare, cut to fan shape and 3-1/2" long, both fans bolted to an old head dampener bracket. It has enough crack to be quite usable. And the head is tuned very tight. John's right-that's what makes it work.
On my cocktail drum I use two ends of a regular snare, cut to fan shape and 3-1/2" long, both fans bolted to an old head dampener bracket. It has enough crack to be quite usable. And the head is tuned very tight. John's right-that's what makes it work.
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matthew medeiros
- Posts: 161
- Joined: Mon Apr 03, 2006 6:43 pm
- Location: Hollister Ca.
- Contact:
Snare sounds
Robert, Another thing you can try, is "porting" the snare drum through the batter side head itself. This was actually somewhat common in the old days on drums such as round badge Gretch drums which did not have air vent holes in the drum shell. The drums where vented with a small hole, usually on the bottom head, about the same size as todays modern air vent holes. Try it on an old used head first to see if it is something you can live with. At the 11 oclock, 12 oclock, or 1 oclock position at the top of the snare draw a line from the two tension lugs to the center of the drum, then about an inch or so from the hoop(gonna depend on how tight you tune the drum) cut a little hole,( a round hole), I use a soldering iron, you will be amazed at the difference. This solution is not for everybody, if you hit your drums real hard this might not be for you, if you don't hit your drums in the center, this might not be for you. anyway, good luck. This method, also, works to port a bass drum if you "stack" a snare on top and do not hit the top side of your bass drum.
Matthew
Robin, I had the same concerns when I first bought my 1964 Ludwig cocktail drum about 9 years ago....Believe me I tried a lot of different things to get a good snare sound when using sticks and was never satisfied until I had a companion snare built to match with the same finish wrap and using vintage hardware.....There's a good picture of it posted in the photos here in the Cocktail Drum Lounge...It's the one with the gold sparkle finish and the matching bongos....I gig mine out often and always get complements on the kit and the sound of the drums........
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matthew medeiros
- Posts: 161
- Joined: Mon Apr 03, 2006 6:43 pm
- Location: Hollister Ca.
- Contact:
I remember your kit, Dave. You definitely did a very nice job on your kit with the matching snare. I did the same thing with my silver sparkle Club Jordan's, had a 12 X 5 snare made to math the silver spakle set, can't really compare the sound with the dedicated snare but then,.... another drum to haul aroundDave wrote:Robin, I had the same concerns when I first bought my 1964 Ludwig cocktail drum about 9 years ago....Believe me I tried a lot of different things to get a good snare sound when using sticks and was never satisfied until I had a companion snare built to match with the same finish wrap and using vintage hardware.....There's a good picture of it posted in the photos here in the Cocktail Drum Lounge...It's the one with the gold sparkle finish and the matching bongos....I gig mine out often and always get complements on the kit and the sound of the drums........
Matthew
Considering ones snare sound is in most cases the major sound of the overall kit, I felt that my 5X10" Eames custom snare was well worth carrying around....The other thing is that if in the future you decide to sell the main cocktail drum you haven't made any major modifications to the drum that may decrease it's resale market to another collector......