Aux Perc - Tambourine
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pedalboy
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Aux Perc - Tambourine
Hey all. I've been doing some work lately where I've been wishing I've had some cool ways of keeping time - enter auxillary percussion. I have a plastic half-moon-shaped tambourine, but it sounds virtiually identical to dropping a large chain on the ground. I was wondering what everyone's favorite tambourines and shakers were like - two rows of bells or one? wood or plastic? large or small? skin or no skin? I'd also like a few tips on playing the tambourine if there are any experts out there - I tend to swing the 8th's a bit.
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digitaldrummer
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as with all instruments, there are many "colors". different hoops, head/no head, brass, nickel, other jingles.... best thing I could offer is go to a store and pick up a couple and buy at least 2 different flavors. I have a cheap plastic (doubel row) and a wooden-hooped single row. different sounds...
shakers: these are easy to make. Get a can, fill with beans or pebbles, seal. Different can materials and shakey bits make different noises, so experiment until you get sounds you like. My favorite can is an empty Clabber Girl Baking Powder tin. The tins are carboard with a metal bottom and plastic top. Easy to change the bits inside, and 3 different tones depending on how you shake it. Also very cool ar the LP "one shot" shakers. No rebound noise on those...
Tamborines: many different ones is the key. We must have at least 10 around our place. Toy ones, good ones, even a few monsters with 4" diameter jingles. Folks hit 'em along with the track to find the one that fits best, then try a take. There's also the "jingle stick" which is a drum stick with a single pair of jingles on it. Surprising how good that can sound with the right snap of the wrist.
This stuff can be much more difficult to play well than many people think. It takes practice to get a good consistant rhythm going, and be able to swing and sit in the pocket. I'm reminded of a "Larry's End Rant" where he describes the percussion box as the Money Maker. So true. A poorly played percussion track can stick out like a sore thumb, even in a dense mix...
Tamborines: many different ones is the key. We must have at least 10 around our place. Toy ones, good ones, even a few monsters with 4" diameter jingles. Folks hit 'em along with the track to find the one that fits best, then try a take. There's also the "jingle stick" which is a drum stick with a single pair of jingles on it. Surprising how good that can sound with the right snap of the wrist.
This stuff can be much more difficult to play well than many people think. It takes practice to get a good consistant rhythm going, and be able to swing and sit in the pocket. I'm reminded of a "Larry's End Rant" where he describes the percussion box as the Money Maker. So true. A poorly played percussion track can stick out like a sore thumb, even in a dense mix...
I thought this club was for musicians. Who let the drummer in here??
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JGriffin
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I have a homemade shaker that gets used all the time around here...it's a handful of coffee beans between 2 paper plates gaff-taped together.
The half-moon tambo can sound good if you mic it right...a foot or two away helps.
The half-moon tambo can sound good if you mic it right...a foot or two away helps.
"Jeweller, you've failed. Jeweller."
"Lots of people are nostalgic for analog. I suspect they're people who never had to work with it." ? Brian Eno
All the DWLB music is at http://dwlb.bandcamp.com/
"Lots of people are nostalgic for analog. I suspect they're people who never had to work with it." ? Brian Eno
All the DWLB music is at http://dwlb.bandcamp.com/
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cgarges
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Man, this is one of my favorite subjects!
I own about 8 or 9 different tambourines and about 10 different shakers. Many of them have very specific sounds, but there are a few that I usually gravitate towards that work great 99% of the time.
My two favorite tambourines in the world are made by LP, which is surprising, considering my grand hatred of most things LP. Neither of these tambourines have rusted, cracked, broken, or fallen apart, so that's what sets them apart from almost all my other LP stuff. Anyway, they're both brass and plastic. One has dimpled jingles, the other does not. The one with the dimpled jingles is a little darker sounding and has a slightly "trashy" quality. The other sounds more like a generic tambourine, but whenever I "audition" tambourines on a session (how stupid is that?), that one almost ALWAYS gets picked.
As far as shakers go, my favorite one was made by my buddy Dave Brockway (a good drummer who used to be in the band Day By The River). It's a Fosters can with tiny, tiny glass beads. I've used it for years, but it's pretty beat-up and not very roadworthy. For a long time, I looked for a manufactured shakler that sounded like this, but to no avail. The LP Soft Shakes (those two little dumbell-looking ones) were close, but they're too quiet for most general use. Many others were too loud. I finally heard one of the Afro (now Pearl) 6" hex ganzas and flipped. It sounded like the Foster's can. I've hipped a lot of people to those things. In fact, Steve Weiss Music is blowing those out right now and they're fairly cheap. The other, smaller Afro/Pearl rectangular black shaker is also a very cool little toy. It's short enough where the long-throw of the shaker works great for slow tempos. It's a lot heavier and grainier-sounding, but gives a nice chug to the rhythm. Another one of my faves is a hand-made straw shaker from India that I bought at a Ten Thousand Villages store.
Sorry for the rant. I love this stuff.
Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC
I own about 8 or 9 different tambourines and about 10 different shakers. Many of them have very specific sounds, but there are a few that I usually gravitate towards that work great 99% of the time.
My two favorite tambourines in the world are made by LP, which is surprising, considering my grand hatred of most things LP. Neither of these tambourines have rusted, cracked, broken, or fallen apart, so that's what sets them apart from almost all my other LP stuff. Anyway, they're both brass and plastic. One has dimpled jingles, the other does not. The one with the dimpled jingles is a little darker sounding and has a slightly "trashy" quality. The other sounds more like a generic tambourine, but whenever I "audition" tambourines on a session (how stupid is that?), that one almost ALWAYS gets picked.
As far as shakers go, my favorite one was made by my buddy Dave Brockway (a good drummer who used to be in the band Day By The River). It's a Fosters can with tiny, tiny glass beads. I've used it for years, but it's pretty beat-up and not very roadworthy. For a long time, I looked for a manufactured shakler that sounded like this, but to no avail. The LP Soft Shakes (those two little dumbell-looking ones) were close, but they're too quiet for most general use. Many others were too loud. I finally heard one of the Afro (now Pearl) 6" hex ganzas and flipped. It sounded like the Foster's can. I've hipped a lot of people to those things. In fact, Steve Weiss Music is blowing those out right now and they're fairly cheap. The other, smaller Afro/Pearl rectangular black shaker is also a very cool little toy. It's short enough where the long-throw of the shaker works great for slow tempos. It's a lot heavier and grainier-sounding, but gives a nice chug to the rhythm. Another one of my faves is a hand-made straw shaker from India that I bought at a Ten Thousand Villages store.
Sorry for the rant. I love this stuff.
Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC
Last edited by cgarges on Sat Dec 31, 2005 9:02 am, edited 1 time in total.
Make sure the mic is 4-5 away at least, and don't try for the same level as the snare drum. Try backwards tambourine, it sounds cool.
You can also disable some of the jingles on cheaper ones with tape and get much faster action.
Rice in a tea tin = nice soft shaker. i have some $2 maracas that have served well, too.
You can also disable some of the jingles on cheaper ones with tape and get much faster action.
Rice in a tea tin = nice soft shaker. i have some $2 maracas that have served well, too.
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digitaldrummer
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i have a Rhythm Tech Studio shaker. they make a tall one and a short one. i reach for it every time. it can give a lot of different sounds that are influenced by your shaker technique. it can give that swiiiiish chick chick sound of a guiro almost which is nice. i have one of those LP guiro/shakers and that thing sucks to record because it sounds like a metal missile silo full of metal peas, but works sorta for live.
for the record, my fav tamb sound is prolly on Phantom Planet's Lonely Day off of that record The Guest. just sounds so natural and like a million bucks.
i have a Stag tambourine or something like that that is wood with a head on it. i have a little small room to do my live mic stuff, so i sit on the floor and shake it with the mic about 6 or 7 feet away and it sounds SWEET. it has two rows of jingles that are nickel...no hammering i dont think. i also have one of those LP plastic things. they suck ass almost always. sometimes, if i want a closer mic sound on the tamb, i use a windscreen and tape a paper towel to the head of the Stag to deaden that weird ring you get sometimes and get closer to the mic. that works too. sometimes, i double it - taped in one channel and 6-7 feet away and open in the other. thats interesting...sometimes!
Grover also makes a really expensive tambourine that sounds REALLY nice and you can put wax on the head to make thumb rolls and all that if youre into it like that. it's designed for classical stuff really.
sleigh bells are sometimes a good tambourine alternative too ya know...though you cant do a lot of 16th notes, remember that Radiohead song on the bends that has that killer scoop distortion riff with the sleigh bells? Airbag i think it is? awesome.
for the record, my fav tamb sound is prolly on Phantom Planet's Lonely Day off of that record The Guest. just sounds so natural and like a million bucks.
i have a Stag tambourine or something like that that is wood with a head on it. i have a little small room to do my live mic stuff, so i sit on the floor and shake it with the mic about 6 or 7 feet away and it sounds SWEET. it has two rows of jingles that are nickel...no hammering i dont think. i also have one of those LP plastic things. they suck ass almost always. sometimes, if i want a closer mic sound on the tamb, i use a windscreen and tape a paper towel to the head of the Stag to deaden that weird ring you get sometimes and get closer to the mic. that works too. sometimes, i double it - taped in one channel and 6-7 feet away and open in the other. thats interesting...sometimes!
Grover also makes a really expensive tambourine that sounds REALLY nice and you can put wax on the head to make thumb rolls and all that if youre into it like that. it's designed for classical stuff really.
sleigh bells are sometimes a good tambourine alternative too ya know...though you cant do a lot of 16th notes, remember that Radiohead song on the bends that has that killer scoop distortion riff with the sleigh bells? Airbag i think it is? awesome.
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My music - www.myspace.com/kenadessamusic
Recording space - www.myspace.com/twinreverbsound
HOT soul music - www.enzoandthebakers.com
Freelance drum hookups available constantly
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cgarges
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A real man can do thumbrolls without the wax.kentothink wrote:Grover also makes a really expensive tambourine that sounds REALLY nice and you can put wax on the head to make thumb rolls and all that if youre into it like that. it's designed for classical stuff really.
Vaughncraft used to make a GORGEOUS classical-style tambourine with German silver jingles. It rings for days. Not sure if they still make it or not.
Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC
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Professor
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You'd think that coming from a classical percussion background I'd have more toys around the studio, but I don't. I have a couple of different shakers including eggs, the shorter RhythmTech one, the LP Soft-Shake (which is used the most by far), and even the larger set of LP 'One-Shot' shakers. On the other hand, I only have one tambourine, but it is about the most flexible one I've found, especially given that it cost under $30 - not sure of the manufacturer but it's a wooden frame with calf head and two rows of silver jingles - and it's the perfect average.
Of course I also have an Alan Abel triangle with a full set of Stoessel beaters (yes, over $100 worth of triangle and beaters) and a SpectraSound Mark Tree (wind chimes) that is easily the best sounding set I've ever used. The secret to great wind chimes is hollow tubes as they sound much more ethereal.
Of course, I'm also sitting atop 6 floors of a School of Music, and I have keys to access the whole building including all the percussion storage areas. So if I need a gong or conga or timpani in the middle of the night it's there.
Like anything else, mic choice and placement are kind of important, though I find that the tracks typically go so low in the mix that the mic choice can be pretty forgiving. Though naturally the last shaker part I added to a song was just tracked on the vocal mic while it was setup, so it was $12 worth of LP Soft-Shake played into a Neumann U-48, through a GT ViPre. Yeah, it sounded OK.
-Jeremy
Of course I also have an Alan Abel triangle with a full set of Stoessel beaters (yes, over $100 worth of triangle and beaters) and a SpectraSound Mark Tree (wind chimes) that is easily the best sounding set I've ever used. The secret to great wind chimes is hollow tubes as they sound much more ethereal.
Of course, I'm also sitting atop 6 floors of a School of Music, and I have keys to access the whole building including all the percussion storage areas. So if I need a gong or conga or timpani in the middle of the night it's there.
Like anything else, mic choice and placement are kind of important, though I find that the tracks typically go so low in the mix that the mic choice can be pretty forgiving. Though naturally the last shaker part I added to a song was just tracked on the vocal mic while it was setup, so it was $12 worth of LP Soft-Shake played into a Neumann U-48, through a GT ViPre. Yeah, it sounded OK.
-Jeremy
another nice homemade shaker - rice in a film canister. Very soft, not loud enough, but forgiving and cool.
I love running shaker tracks back through my EH Delux Memory Man. Or on the way in, especially if I want some random ambient background vocals... crank the headphones and try to channel the music.
I love running shaker tracks back through my EH Delux Memory Man. Or on the way in, especially if I want some random ambient background vocals... crank the headphones and try to channel the music.
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