What are the notes of a drum kit?

For a set of drums, it's the fundamental pitches that should be tuned to a musical relationship. If you want to tune your drums to specific notes, you should be adjusting the fundamental pitches, not the overtone pitch you get when you tap near the lugs. read more

Most drums in a common drum kit produce a series of complex overtones that are practically as loud as the fundamental tone produced by the drum head — especially snare drums and two-headed toms where a second head and snares produce more overtones than the single head of a melodic tom or specialty drums like Tama Octobans or Remo Rototoms. read more

In common drum set music, as in the figure above, it is generally understood that the notes from top to bottom are hi-hat, snare, bass. The timing of each sound depends on the progression of the notes from left to right. read more

« Back To Drum Lessons Reading Drum Notation. This lesson is intended to give you a quick-overview of all the drum notation symbols used on this website. You can think of this page as a drum-key or legend for all the different drum set voices that you play within beats, fills, and solo patterns. read more