Are you a musician?

When I was in high school we talked about how there are three types of people who hit musical instruments: percussionists, drummers, and "dummers." It's sort of a matter of pride with us to be called a "percussionist," not a "drummer." (However, there have been countless times in my professional life that I've been very happy to be, "the drummer.")

These days, I like to think of myself as a musician who happens to also play percussion. Because music is created in so many different ways by so many different instruments, we should put the music first and the instrument second.

Are we all clear? We're musicians who play percussion. That being said...

In my view, there are six major categories of percussion with which students should be familiar. I'll give a very brief introduction of five of the six over the next week or so.*

So, to introduce the first area I'll focus on, two of my fave marimbists playing one of my favorite pieces.

Enjoy!




*Why not all six, you ask? Because drum set is one of the six, and I spend most of my time on this blog talking about and exploring drum set. I'll be giving only a brief overview of the others at this time.