Musician

One of the oldest instruments in the world, the frame drum comes in various shapes and sizes these days. Just about every region of every country seems to be home to its own unique frame drum. Some are equipped with loads of jingles, while other types only have a few jingles or none at all. One thing that all frames have in common however, is a drumhead. Let’s take a quick trip around the world and look at a number of well-known frame drums.

The clarinet is one of those instruments that everyone will be familiar with but actually know very little about. The clarinet has a long history and, today, forms part of an endless list of different musical styles and genres. High time to learn more about this versatile woodwind instrument!

Practising any instrument can be a tedious process, especially when trying to find the extra time to do so. Many people believe that practice has to be hours a day to achieve any tangible results. That couldn’t be further from the truth! Guest blogger Evan Chapman shows how we can utilise 20 minutes a day to effectively practise drums.

If you’ve got a valve guitar amp, you’re no doubt well aware that the specific valves inside it largely determine your sound. You might also know that there are roughly 25 different valves used for guitar amplifiers, four of which you’ll bump into all the time. What you might not know, however, is that there’s a very specific valve that kick-started what we now call ‘vintage’ sound way back when: the rectifier valve. And guess what? It’s regaining popularity again!

Made it through our previous article on the CAGED system and want to learn more? Great! By the end of this one, you’ll have five major and five minor chord shapes at your disposal that you can move up and down the fretboard of your guitar.

Sometimes, you come across instruments that have a pretty special origin-story, a unique design or even a weird sound. Companies that develop and produce percussion instruments often bring out some weird and wonderful sound-making tools designed to create a specific sound effect. In this blog, we take a closer look at some of the more remarkable percussive instruments out there and see how they can be deployed to mimic the sounds of nature, so you can build your own organic soundscapes.

With the release of the Yamaha Reface synthesizers, the Japan-based music-gear-makers bring back a stone-cold slice of music history. Here, we chart the origin-stories of these superheroes among synths.

Can you imagine? You’re about to perform on stage and suddenly your signal drops out because the cable broke. Fortunately, every gigging musician’s worst nightmare can be easily avoided. Here’s five tips for preventing cable breakage.

In our other blog about modulation effects, three mod-based taste-makers were conspicuously missing and, even despite their instantly recognisable sound, these effects are used more often than you might think. If you want to take your guitar sound a little further than your more standard modulation effects can, then why not consider throwing a little tremolo, a bit of vibrato or a rotary effect into the mix?

While most people play a musical instrument because they simply love making music, it’s worth pointing out that starting out at a young age has several positive side-effects on the brain. In other words, that starter kit that you got your kid for Christmas last year might yield some unexpected results in the long run!

Acoustic drum kits are often configured to match a specific style, which is why rock-based drummers usually opt for a rock-configured kit, while jazz drummers are more likely to go for a little bebop kit. That said, there’s no reason why you can’t lay down jazz patterns with a rock kit or vice versa. Besides, a good drummer will always make sure that the sound of their kit matches the style of music, no matter how the kit is configured. Want to pull a more jazzy sound out of your kit? Read on for a few tips and tricks.

While the sound of nothing but your guitar and amplifier is undeniably awesome, sometimes you might want to be able to throw in a touch more variation. By sticking a few effect pedals between your guitar and amp, you can put a whole world of sound at your feet. But do you go for a bunch of separate stompboxes loaded onto a pedalboard or would you prefer a more one-stop-style solution in the form of a multi-effects unit? In this blog, we take a look at both, so you can kit yourself out with exactly what you need, whether you’re a guitarist, or a bassist who wants to be more than just part of the rhythm section.