 Welcome to the drum history podcast. I'm your host Bart van der Zee and today. I'm joined by Fritz Stegger in Germany Fritz Welcome to the show. Hey. Hi, bud. Nice Being on the show. Yeah, I should have asked where exactly are you in Germany? I'm going to the south of Germany. I'm just 10 minutes away from Switzerland and France. Oh, cool It's a triangle between these three countries Wow sounds like a nice place to live you get a little bit of a little bit of everything there. Yeah Very nice. It's called a black forest area. We have a lot of nice countryside good food influenced by the French and Yeah, it's good good spot. Cool. A lot of fun. I'm really happy to have you on the show here today You were recommended by Norbert same on who's become a really good friend of the show from Meinl who is Gracious enough to send me You know tips on people who he thinks would be really good guests on the show and you were very highly recommended So I should mention to you on the drum house Freiberg Which is your shop, correct? Yeah, correct. Cool. Well, we can talk about that more later, but um, so Today's topic and we talked on the phone maybe a few weeks ago and kind of got a little bit of a game plan together But it's sort of evolved like I don't think we really had Too much of a plan. I kind of went into it thinking you're an expert on as Norbert told me like You know European drum manufacturing, which is obviously correct but you sort of Brought it to my attention that a lot of the things that as an American I think You know like we talked about like you were mentioning the drum set was invented in New Orleans in the 20s I mean Europe in general Germany you guys it's so much older. It goes back so much further So there's a lot of misconceptions about The birth of the drum set and these various little pieces of gear So today we're gonna kind of tackle some of these I Don't want to call myths, but maybe what is an American we think is true And maybe it's not true because it's it's different in Europe. So on that note. Why don't you drop some knowledge on us? Yeah, well, um, as far as I know the drum or the drums were brought in by the genocide music Military music and of the 16th century and like Turkish military and They made a contract with the Austrians and that was a time in 1699 when They had genocide music bands playing in Vienna and From that point it was adopted to European classical music Mozart and all this stuff. So it came into the classical music and all also later on to the brass bands and so They had a bass drum and they had Like what we call snare drum now, which is like they called it the tambour and Also, the Turkish obviously knew the secret how to make cymbals as we know from the silicon company Who have the great secret from 1623? I think and so they had the three parts bass drum snare drum and cymbals and You can imagine that when a marching band Played practice and maybe it was winter time and it was very difficult to get some was somewhere Maybe if somebody was ill and so they had one player and three instruments so naturally one started to play the snare drum and kicked the bass drum and Maybe hung up a cymbal somewhere on a on a stand and played it as well Just I think this happened completely normal in different areas all over Europe and the world and And so the first base bass drum pedal patent Is from 1896 I think so it's much earlier than the the drum set in New Orleans, which speaks that Before that somebody tried to play the bass drum with a foot pedal and playing the snare at the same time Yeah, it's it's really interesting because uh, there's I've talked about it before There's the famous picture of a guy sitting with a snare The double drumming kind of picture What's the guy with with the snare drum on his chair? And then he's got the bass drum and you kind of think of like It inventing there, but I always there's just like Things naturally happen like you're saying like it's Without a doubt someone would just sit there and think to themselves like oh if I do this it I can do all these things at one time so it's not like That surprising to me that someone wouldn't have thought of this before um Which is interesting. So wow, that's really neat Yeah, and and I'm gonna say I mean some Maybe in this band was a smith who just said okay I will build you a little device and this happened somewhere in italy and at the same time The same thing happened in germany. I mean this was at that time They had the instruments and they wanted to play it and I mean Yeah, they did it and um I have pictures of marching or brass bands like When I talk about marching bands, it's not only the military bands They're also also the brass bands the civil brass bands and I have pictures from like 1875 where you see a drummer playing The big bass drum and the snare drum and of course the Snare drum is flipped to the right side because when you were marching the The snare was flipping to the right side. So for that they put it on a stand and flipped it over As the same position as they used to walk Yeah Gosh, that's fascinating. I mean, there's no right or wrong to this either where like no, we were first we were first I think and there was so many um immigrants coming from Going coming and going, you know what I mean coming from america going to europe and And coming to america from europe so things obviously had to travel which is The the story of the new orleans kind of drum set is that people it would be uh people coming from africa Obviously usually against their will which is terrible, but um And then spreading the drums and then it would evolve from there and jazz was invented and then do all that so it's No matter what it's always kind of a melting pot of Cultures and it sounds like like you said in europe people are in italy they're kind of combining um uh Their backgrounds and and what they do now. I want to ask you too. So when you talked a little bit about the bass drum pedal Let's get into that a little bit because that's sort of like There is such a wide big history on bass drum pedals But I think a lot of people think that the first modern invented, you know patented bass drum pedal was 1909 with Ludwig which kind of kicked off the company right so but You're kind of saying that they were doing that earlier in europe, correct? Yeah, I mean there is an american patent from 1897 I think and I saw pictures of older pedals Basically very very very basic. I mean like made out of wood and um Some out of metal but very basic, but I don't think that we can really tie it down This was invented here and there it just happened um, and I mean Ludwig and uh fridrich gretz they were germans and they brought The ideas to america and then developed the stuff over there and I mean it's for sure that between 1910 and 1945 there was much more happening In america because we had Two world wars here over in europe and that had to do I mean Original disner drum was built out of out of brass I mean It's very interesting that in uh, germany there is no Title of a drum builder. We don't have drum builder as a profession but When you are a brass instrument builder, that's a real profession you can be trained in and you can do a master degree and like till 10 years before ago Uh, when you were a brass instrument builder, you also automatically had the degree of a drum builder This came of the time when all snare drums and drums were made out of brass But always Wars have to do that the military needs all the metal And then the people started to build things out of wood same happened in america with the rolling bombers in 1940s Built by slingerland and Ludwig where all the lugs and stands and everything was made out of wood and so They started to build drums out of wood as well In america we had the government ruling like you're saying where you can't use You know x amount of more materials at 10 per cent metal per drum So obviously what you're saying is that you have to uh, germany had that same thing, correct? So are there Is it did it go as far on german drums where like there were lugs that were wood? You know what i mean? I only really think of that with american drums, but did it get that serious over there as well? Um, I don't think that at that time Germans were able to build drums at all. I mean we we were affected by the war very heavily. I mean Look at what happened at the american drum manufacturing between 1910 and 1945 there was so much happening and big drums slingerland and grave black beauty drums and Leedy beautiful snare drums wonderful drum sets here we had 1914 the first world war and I mean nobody could build drums. Nobody could afford drums After the first world war people were very poor. So They just probably repaired what they had and then they're building up a new industry And then when the nazis came in 1933 Jazz music and all the popular music coming from america was forbidden because the nazis didn't want to have this music so again, they had all only brass bands and military bands. So they needed a snare drum at a time when um Over overseas a lot of what was going on in chicago and jazz and all these things and then all started after the second world war in germany again when american troops were here in germany playing american music and so Then that's the time when everything started with german bands playing jazz and then of course rock and roll Beat music rock and this is when we started to import Instruments from america. I mean Everyone wanted to have a Ludwig drum or a great drum here in europe and so german companies started to Copy and invent same things and this is when everything started here, but we had a Had two different difficult times where nothing happened First world war second world war Yeah, and a few thoughts on that. I mean i'm just i'm sure like um Like here it makes me think of like in america and like the time of like prohibition when people couldn't drink It didn't mean people weren't drinking it just meant they got really good at sneaking And having these like little speakeasies with clubs It makes me think that if you know if in nazi germany, they said that you can't have jazz I'm sure people still love jazz and probably hit it and uh, and we're very which would be very very risky obviously, but You know, it's like I think that that's just an interesting thought of like maybe people were sneaking and kind of practicing and like an underground kind of thing I don't know if that you know, there's any truth behind that at all I doubt that very much. I mean probably people listen to jazz music on the radio Yeah, I mean there are stories and I know that my grandfather He used to have the illegal radio using it underneath the pillow and listening to to bbc wow, but I mean there was I mean Jazz music has to do with noise and I mean there was no place you could hide And play secretly jazz because everyone every neighbor would have definitely Reported you and you would be thrown to jail. So I doubt that there was any live music or Illegal clubs were going this was much too restricted and I mean everybody could be your enemy. So everything you did illegally had to be Absolutely in secret and absolutely quiet And so it had to be so quiet that even your kids shouldn't hear when you listen to to BBC London because they could tell that in the school to Classmate and the classmate would report it to the teacher and then the Gestapo would Be in front of your door and throw you to jail because you you were not allowed to to listen to to the BBC Man, what a as I as you're saying that I'm like, man What I asked was kind of a dumb question because of course you're not going to secretly Be playing jazz. It's not worth it that but your other Point about how everyone wanted Ludwigs and Gretsch drums and and I mentioned to you before about It's it's kind of a hard topic and I've been I've been working on an episode about it, but about Not really in You know world war two, but like just in In general broader Europe Eastern Europe about the smuggling of American drums into Soviet countries, which is something I'm really interested in and is kind of there's some articles about it, which I'm I've read and they're fascinating, but About getting these drums in and or Soviet countries Making, you know copies almost like you think of like the Japanese stencil drums, but they would be Kind of copies in that eastern block Now any any info on that like the kind of smuggling of drums Yeah, I mean, I know that that was smuggling of drums, but um There I mean eastern germany, for example, they had musicians who came over to to western germany I mean if they were If they were considered that they were So so socialistic Located that they go back to eastern germany, then they could go and play That was always interest in exchange from from west to east and vice versa and So they had a chance to bring instruments and maybe camouflage them make them look old, but Also, they imported drums. I know from Pistey from the symbol manufacturer who also Was this tributa for Heyman drums? He brought a lot of Heyman drums into the eastern european countries legally because the The professional bands they demanded for better instruments and basic instruments like the Eastern german made tecton and trover drums. They were very basic. They were Didn't sound very good. So the professional musicians really wanted to have good drums and so Because peiste was originally from estonia, which was then part of the Part of russia So they made a contract with thomas peiste bringing in drums to to eastern europe That's interesting. I know I've um Like way way way way way more recent. Um, the guys who did the gms drums episode Also got a distribution kind of deal through peiste and had a lot of help from them In the 80s late 80s early 90s. Um, so So it's kind of cool that peiste carried that on a little bit. Um So and I remember on the phone you mentioned something to me about some like blueprints with peiste and being stolen and stuff like that What was that story? Uh, basically when when the wall between eastern and western germany came down end of the the 80s um they try to rebuild factories and Yeah, I get everything settled over there and um They considered that the old sonor factory which was after the second world were run by the by the Eastern German state Was not worth to rebuild it because I mean it was really working on a very old machinery and so they basically sold it and um I knew a man who basically bought all machines all inventory everything and he came with a big truck And loaded drum hats and old machinery and so and there was also a big sort of cupboard metal cupboard and it was full of folders and the the The last manager of the eastern german factory. He said no no no this is belongs to the german Or the eastern german government Which didn't exist at that stage anymore and he said no no no i bought everything and so i own also the folders so he took all the folders and so These folders had sonor on them. They had lefima on another manufacturer. They had piste and um, so he was looking into these folders and they had blueprints of complete machineries one to one the hammers how um piste used to hammer the symbols they had blueprints of the lugs sonor lugs and everything and so this man tried to make some money out of these folders and Um sold them to a couple of factories. I know that piste bought the folder. I don't know for how much money And it was quite scary because uh, there was a lot of private information in this folder and so the Stasi, which was the secret service of eastern germany they really made a profile on thomas piste and Found out everything about his private life what? Kind of drinking habits with his friends and everything So that was quite scary that they just wanted to know find out all these things um, maybe to blackmail him or whatever, but I mean obviously nothing happened but um On many of these blueprints. There was always a stamp saying we can't do that because we don't have the material So they didn't have the exact access for the material like bronzer bronze eight percent for example what what I used to make the symbols of or b20s bronze like sylvan Material they couldn't couldn't get in eastern germany. So they couldn't make the symbols And uh, I know that I think so no bought a folder and maybe lefima as well but unfortunately a lot of these folders Were scrapped by the the son of the guy who made the deal and so they're gone forever Wow So interesting. I mean it's very um, it's almost like a movie You know to think of these like folders of it kind of makes the drum world seem more I mean, but it is very important stuff. Um This just information about about how you create this and you know this and that and lugs and all that so that's fascinating It's similar in america to like let's say like the fbi or like the cia one of these organizations where like you don't want them looking into your personal information Yeah, a little bit scary. Yeah, when you when you look into the drum building run drum manufacturing of eastern germany You had to always and I think this is with many things like cars or planes There was always a a phase where they copied strongly western models and then there was another area where they um made an own thing and then there was a copying phase again, so the first uh drover drum sets built after the war in the old son of hectare um were really an own Very interesting looking sort of art deco design Which was quite interesting, but probably it was not very popular and Then in the 60s they copied hundred percent the teardrop lugs of sonoa and then in the beginning of the 80s they had a new completely new own design and then they started to copy sonoa completely again And um, yeah, that's quite interesting, but the quality was always very very poor and um I don't think that they could sell Many drum sets into into western europe, but um, obviously sold a lot of drums into all eastern state and I was I was writing a book about um german drums some years ago and um I was bombing into a into a famous drummer of santana from kuba and um um He looked at my book and and then he said oh, this is a tecton drum and I said Why do you know this tecton drums from there from eastern germany? I said, oh, we had him kuba when I played as a kid and this is I mean kuba kuba was um was was a communist and that's the reason they get these eastern german drums into kuba wow That's fascinating. I gotta ask was it walfredo? Yeah, yeah, yeah He's it's funny because he um is an awesome guy. He lives A couple minutes away from me. I mean he lives here where I live He actually lives across the river in in kentucky, which is 10 minutes away, but um, we've kind of become uh, we have become friends over the uh Yeah, and I mean I couldn't believe is I bummed to him at frankfurt music fair and I showed him the book and then I've never thought that he got spot Eastern german made drum set we in I mean this was the The worst case if your parents would buy you an eastern german drum you could buy it from from like like mail order Somehow but not in the music store. Oh man, and then he said oh, I started on tecton That's so funny. I mean you Being here in america, I mean the whole and I think around the world obviously they um, I know in germany that that there was the huge fear of communism and here there was this massive fear of these communist countries and it's going to take over everything which you know right or wrong whatever but You you kind of forget about how far Communism spread and how they would like Supply these communist, you know brands or whatever in those countries two places like cuba and stuff You you you don't really think about that sometimes and how these inst it doesn't drums doesn't come to your mind first You know what I mean like of things being spread around. That's that's really cool Yeah, I even saw saw uh eastern european drums in in vietnam. I mean, yeah, exactly I mean, but we never thought about them. I mean, yeah no Wow, okay. Um now I gotta ask because I have worked I keep I gotta quit saying it but I've been working on an episode about this topic about tricks and drums And I have really had a hard time finding the the people who I've been suggested speak very little english And they're absolute experts on tricks and but they're the the english is not they say I can't come on your show I can't you know, I can type it but I can't speak it well enough, but Where does tricks and fit into this? You know, maybe we kind of pivot now just while we're talking about german stuff and german drums Where does tricks and fit in that because I mean these are just some Out there drums, obviously Yeah, I mean, uh, karlheinz weimar. He was from hamburg. I mean, so he's he's western german and He started basically after the war with the drum and drum manufacturing and This was quite a very very successful company. I mean Sonor drums were Existed before the first world war. They were found in 1875 so um The factory was in eastern germany. So When the second world was ended console autolink he was escaping The eastern german government and it was quite interesting story because The gestapo came to his house to arrest him And he could jump out of a window in the garden where his son Picked him up with a stolen ambulance and drove him into western germany. Oh my god. So he came into Yeah, different stations. He ended up in wittgenstein and The Wittgenstein helped him to find new factories. So sonor started in germany and I mean they had all the know-how from before the war and that was the number one in the sonor factory in eastern germany that built the trover and tecton drums and Then the second strong brand was tricks and found by karlheinz weimar in hamburg They had also other companies. There was in kassel. There was Tromsad drums and they had in bavaria Dairy or rimmel drums. These were the main manufacturers after the second world war And tricks tricks and had quite good context to jazz drummers. They had a Yeah, I mean they're pictured with him and gene krupa and Yeah, a lot of american drummers and so he had a lot of ideas and crazy ideas like doing the tail star and the speed fire drum kills and Yeah, pretty cool stuff And yeah, and so people know that i'm sure people have seen him But maybe they don't know what brand they were just if someone's listening who's kind of a newer drummer These are the drums that they You know one side is like let's say the the Side the batter side that you're kicking is an 18 inch and it goes down to like a 14 or 16 And yeah, there was the tail star like they had they had a bass drum I mean they had a normal Rack tom but I had a bass drum where the the kick side was 20 and and The bottom side was 16 and the same drum was used As a as a floor tom with a 16 batter had and a 20 resonant had I didn't know it was the same drum Yeah, and they had very weird crocodile finishes in lilac and Crazy colors pretty cool, but buddy rich played tricks and drums at that time called vox drums in america And he had an endorsement from 66 to 67 so they had a quite Famous and Rossi Yeah, in buddy rich inclined stubble field from um, and then I guess All the drummers because um, james brown had many drummers, but I think they use the vox Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is which is so neat. So this I think is not true But I think I read in an article for drum magazine or one of them where when um When carl heins weimer Died I heard he wanted to be buried with his whole inventory of drums Or he destroyed all of his drums when he died like right before he died or something like that But oh, actually someone told me that's not true. Uh, not really. I mean, I mean what happened I mean Why is tricks not around? I mean there were a big player at that time and very popular What happened is that at the end of the 60s it was very very attractive to invest in in ireland for some political tax reasons and so he made a fusion with um An irish piano factory called rippon and they made a fusion and he Brought all the production from germany into ireland and then basically rippon went bankrupt and he lost everything and so probably this Yeah killed him in the end. Yeah geez that's there's so many um I guess it's in a lot of businesses But there's so many things that you hear about with businesses that that happen time after time with drum brands Like like that where there was maybe a bad investment And it just went under or they tried to partner or they tried to save money with this or they get a big Endorser for a year like buddy rich and it then they go away. But like there's a lot of Parallels with a lot of these companies. Um, both american german any any country. There's brothers splitting up that happens all the time I mean, it's it's probably Very difficult. I mean there are not so many dramas around, I mean Like even in the brass band you need like 20 or 30 saxophones or trumpets and whatever But you only have one drummer and if you're a guitar player you can have 30 guitars on your wall, but I mean I know a couple of Marriages who broke because the drummer had like five drum sets in the in the in the kitchen So, um, yeah, it's not an easy instrument to collect and and Yeah, you know what I mean. Oh, I know what you mean. And it's funny. You say that because uh um, I recently had and people listening to the show are probably thinking the same thing I'm I'm thinking where uh, Mike Corrado, who's a very, you know, yeah esteemed collector here He has 650 snare drums in his house Um all over and he's married and so I think that's everyone's thought was like, what about Mike Corrado? He's he's breaking the mold But you're right. You're right. I have a I have a Drum set in my front hall and we're moving in a couple days and my wife said, okay So now we're going to put the drum set away and no more drums in the front hall. I'm like It was great while it lasted Yeah, um, I mean difficult was definitely the The arrival of the japanese drum companies. I mean they They were really good in listening to drummers I mean, I was around at that time and I remember how Quick all that that happened. I mean The industry here in germany was Basically sonor, but I mean everybody was keen on Ludwig rogers slingerland drums because all our heroes played them and um Then all of a sudden in within five years this happened that I mean all these companies were gone and and everybody was playing pearl tama yamaha and that happened very very quick and They they listened very good to the demand what drummers really wanted. I mean tama got billy cobbum and he said, you know My problem is always when I have big drum sets that I need an extra Tom arm here and an extra mount there and then they invented this multi multi clamp system and they had invented the drum rags and and Yeah, and this happened so quick and I mean And infected affected every drum company in the world. I mean Premiere was bankrupt at that time and then sold to yamaha Ludwig was sold to con Slingerland was gone rogers was gone um sonor Yeah, they was was sold to khs eventually so Yeah, that was a big big cut end of the the 80s Yeah, and I remember talking to norbert about the minor history and he kind of I didn't realize the the connection there between Uh minor and star drums and about how they became the distributor of hoshino in germany, so it's kind of You know, I guess you can't have the the the story of um japanese drums coming into germany without Discussing, you know Minals a part of that which is which is interesting because that was a big part of their business was bringing in the japanese stuff And I know um, I've said it a bunch on this show But like about how people at slingerland were kind of showing people the japanese, you know businessman or drum builders in and showing them some of the factories for slingerland and then they went back and um Took the uh ideas and then made these drums. So I don't think a lot of people realized how uh I don't want to say devastating, but I want to say like just how massive the impact of of these drums coming into um all over the world was to the the uh The drum kind of you know Just the the way things were before it's really fascinating Yeah, I mean minor he started to talk to the japanese and um He had he had a small business in building cases for brass instruments and um There was after the war a big demand for symbols and so Like Schools ask him. Do you have symbols and then he started to make them himself? He mean he just Got some some brass and hammered them himself and then he was the first man. I think he who invented the machine to to um to press the symbols and um And then he was speaking at the frankfurt music fair to japanese producers to hoshino who had star drums and um Nobody really wanted to make business with these people at that time and he was the first one and I know from Colleagues of him who laughed about him and said what do you want to do with these Japanese drums and then He could sell them quite quickly because they were much cheaper than the german drums and At that time star was copying Two lines on the one hand they had Slingerland rogers copies and on the other hand they had also sonor lugs and sonor hoops And so in europe they had more the sonor type in america. They had more the slingerland type, but then they quite soon started to make own designs and going away from copying and um at one stage that was what has there been around 1968 or 69 minal had both drums pearl and tama drums or star drums at that time and um The the japanese didn't like that. So he had to decide whether he wanted to go for pearl or for star and he he stayed with star and then um pearl went to another distributor and then billy cobbam came along and tama got most Famous drum brand here in europe in the 70s and end of the 70s Yeah, they brought out the imperial star the superstar and got a lot of big endorses and The same time ladwig was setting free so many top endorses and pearl and tama just got them all and then Yeah The drum world changed. Yeah And um also at that time for example When you wanted to buy a drum set you had to buy i mean here in europe I don't know how it was in the states, but when i would was a kid like Had a drum kid and i had symbol stands i had everything and I want to have a new shell set but that was not possible when i wanted to buy a new ladwig drum kit I only could Purchase it with stands snare drum and everything And the japanese Understood that a lot of people just want to have shells and that they want to play around so They made it simple. They had only two colors at that time, but had Arranged from six to 18 of single drums, which every distributor stocked in a big Amount and so it was very easy to get access to these drums and build your own drum kits at that time you had double bass drum kits with a lot of toms and Yeah, that was completely different I did not know that i mean So i mean i was born in 90 so this is obviously way before you know my time but like When i came up with drumming um It was like obviously in that time i mean you know in 2000 You know when i'm getting buying drums and stuff as a young kid But like you can get sets with symbols and everything But for the most part you go and you buy drums and you get just the drums and you You know you think well crap now I need to save more money and buy more stands, but so you're saying that in that Earlier point in time you want Ludwig you get a bass drum pedal you get stands you get everything I never really knew that Yeah, you had to buy the whole set and i mean I grew up in a in a city with a population of around 200 000 people and We had three music three music stores and In one music store you had a blue pearl drum set and in the other one you had a green Ludwig and then the third you had a a gray slingland And that's it and you had to choose between the three drums and so I went for a orange Rogers headliner for I mean I rather wanted to have like four toms, but this had one rag tom, but that's That's all I could get The city so I had to learn to play with with a without the second second rag tom and What what was good for me? yeah, god you you You take so many things for granted now of like Uh, like oh well just get on um, you know just order another tom or get any color drum set Ever made that you want even now you can buy a vintage anything on reverb or whatever But um, it's just interesting to think about that like those are your three options in Yeah, and that was I mean getting getting a second tom I mean at that time it was here in in Germany quite normal that you started With a snare drum and played snare drum for a couple of years Especially when you were trained in a brass band and they gave you a snare drum and said okay learn The technique you got stick control and then So after two years the teacher would say okay get him a bass drum then you went to a shop and you could buy a single bass drum and you could afford it and then You played a bass drum and then a year later you got a hi-hat machine and At that time a lot of drum sets had only a bass drum and one rag tom no floor tom and then you see when you buy vintage drums that the floor tom is A couple of years later and has has a different design Yeah, so today you'd rather buy a complete drum set. It's much cheaper than buying it in singles. Oh sure now um Just jumping off here a little bit also I just wanted to ask is we we kind of started talking about you know, like the misconceptions of who invented what and when this happened I want to ask you What is your I know it's I feel like it can't be proven one way or the other But what is your theory on the invention of the hi-hat? Who do you think invented the hi-hat because a lot of it comes people a lot of what I've heard is it's this american guy This american guy, but you know, I'm sure again. We're talking about europe. Where do you see it? I mean I first I mean I know I have catalogs from now around 1900 Uh where you can see bass drum paddles Where they play the cymbal at the same time So they have a bass drum and then they have the cymbal sitting next to it And you could either play both bass drum and cymbal or just the bass drum Also, I know that that was the invention of the low boy Which was Probably same like the bass drum pedal. I mean, I don't think that is I mean when you when you push two symbols together with your hands Somebody might have the idea to just put it on a on a foot pedal. I mean exactly. Probably this is the same happening in different parts of the world around the same time and The easiest idea is to say, okay. Why you have this higher pedal on the floor just Make it on a on a stand and then you can play it at the same time There's I think this happened around 1920 then in real yeah People say it's papa joe jones who had a friend who's a plumber I had an episode about it with rob cook who there's another gentleman whose name is completely escaping me right now Who they think he invented it? I mean, it's just one of those topics that it's very I think that it probably Has happened in in multiple places At different times. It's sort of like Like we've just been saying it it evolved naturally You know, like it just sort of obviously if the low boy is down there and you hear the uh the um Skip rutherford is the guy's name who I was just saying who rob cook thinks He says invented it, but there's the story of someone dropping their stick and they hit it and they go Oh, man, I can play this with with a stick and not just my foot But um, okay, I just didn't know if you were gonna be like well actually in germany. We did it in 1830 we had a high hat and There's something like that now, I mean I could have go through my archives and look into Some photos, but I don't I can't remember normally they had the What what they had as a standard was that they had on the bass drum um The cymbal mounted on top of the bass drum And you could play with one hand the cymbal And with the other hand you play the snare drum This is what you see on pictures around 1850 or something Hmm Yeah, that's neat and then it just evolves from there you you kind of look at it and you go Why didn't they just do that? You know, why didn't you just end up with why didn't you think ahead? But like you can't You can't jump forward and see things Uh the way they're going to be But I feel like I mean this is pretty obvious, but I feel like the drum set We've been pretty consistent with the drum set as is for for quite a while now You know what? I mean like it really changed in those early days, but seems like we've been pretty uh Do you see any major changes happening in the next, you know, like I just I can't see any big changes happening It seems it seems pretty happy right now Yeah, I mean it depends what kind of music people want to want to make. I mean I see a big um cut I mean we had like A long period where you could see Grandparents parents and and grandchilds in a at a Bob Dylan or Rolling Stones concert and Now I can see that young people listen to completely different things and yeah, it depends what kind of Involvement of the drums they need whether they do everything electronic Or whether they use still acoustic drums, but I can't can't really tell but you're right. I mean things Where the drums had stayed For a very long period very very similar. We were talking on the phone before I mean when you look at the at the bass drum, for example um You had a size of 28 26 24 inch and 14 deep And this happened and stayed till In the middle of the 80s. I mean This is when they start extra deep drums and they started to make 22 by 16 22 by 18 and realized oh At 22 by 18 drum sounds much bigger than a 20 22 by 14 But the 14 inch had to do with the the shoulder The size of the shoulder of a marching person And this is 14 inch. This is For a normal man walking And this is why when they put the bass drum on the floor They could have used every size, but they stuck 100 years with 14 inch Till they started. Oh moment. We could make it deeper. Yeah Geez that's what you just said sums it up all so so perfectly of like 100 years or so of that of like Oh wait, we could make it smaller Make whatever okay, we'll make it smaller now. That's so neat Okay, man, this is awesome. I feel like this this episode is just full of a bunch of little tidbits of um Of I mean really for people not really only in america, but for in in all the non, you know European countries it might be obvious for people in germany and stuff But what you're saying and a lot of this isn't very obvious to us. Um and people in different, you know All around the world. So this is really fascinating. Why don't we take a little bit at the end here and talk about um Your shop and everything how long have you been an owner of a drum store? Oh My own store gets 20 um 20 years old next year, but I was working in the business for like over 30 years um I was working I started at another shop And then I was working for industry work for a couple of drum companies and did all sorts of different things working in factories and um, then like 20 years ago. I decided to start my own drum shop here and Still very happy to do that. I mean, it's Not easy in these days and a lot of things changed and um Yeah, manufacturing wise and I mean, as you say before I mean when you had drum kids Starting from the 60s on every five years They came a new model But there was a big gap when you got the new model There was so many different new things and it was a real new drum set But if a company now brings out a new drum set, it's just a different drum set It has a new name as has different finishes. But as you said before it's basically Same drum set. Yeah and I know um, I worked at guitar center Uh In the drum department here, which I don't know if they do they have guitar center in in uh, Germany no, no, we don't have guitar center But you know what it is though, obviously make a big big box store, which a lot of people they actually I think they're just filed for bankruptcy um, but um And I worked there. I was 16 or 17 and I worked there for probably six months Um, kind of a summer job that went long, but I didn't sell a single drum set Like at all. I didn't even it didn't even come up. No one came in. I wasn't working there all the time I was you know after school, but like it it's just like it was sticks and heads and stuff, but you know So it's not like you said like guitars even guitars you can buy a guitar for you know 300 bucks that's decent, but a drum set you're really dropping a lot of money So it's sort of tough in that regard too. I'm sure selling these expensive drum sets I mean you get a lot of budget drum sets and I'm probably Making most of my money selling selling Beginner instruments because people the parents want to go Into a shop and and get somebody who they trust When the kids are 16 17. I mean they go on on the internet they go into um Blocks and chat with other people and get their ideas and they say oh, it's The easiest way to get it over mail order. I'll just get it from the internet and buy this and that so I don't get these people normally because they just Order whatever and where it's cheapest and then I have a lot of customers who were with me since 30 years and who Also always buy from my shop and if they want to buy an electronic drum kit They say can you get me one and they don't ask for the price? They just know that I make the good price and Yeah, this is how I'll make the money at these days We sell obviously a lot of electronic drum kits A lot of drum teachers didn't accept them Um many years ago or some years ago. They didn't accept Electronic drum kits that but they got much better And since you have these mesh drum kits mesh hat drum kits electronic drum kits um Yeah, that I work quite fine for a lot of young kids who work Who who live in in houses where they can't use a acoustic drum kit? So This is part of the business while i'm Still very much into acoustic drums and I prefer them a lot more but My own my own i practice on the On an electronic drum kit as well. I'm right there with you I'm like In my house because like when I play on the drums that I have here And then I have like a music space where I have a kit but like I want to get an electric kit because it's like I have to play especially having like a baby who's running around like I have to play Very lightly when I'm using like brushes And I'm not really a jazz brush guy. I love it, but I'm just it's not how I was trained But like I'm doing it just to be quiet and I'm like, okay I need to get like an electric kit Put it on like the third floor of my house and just go like Play for real. I mean there's there's such a difference of like plain Real acoustic drums knowing that you're being too loud. You you can't I mean for me I just mentally physically i'm holding back so um I need to buy an electric drum set, but they're an investment man I mean they are expensive for real for guys like us who really want a real one Like a pro one. They're pricey. So um, I don't think that's right or wrong. I think as a guitar player you have a a classical guitar to play Beethoven and you have a A western guitar to play at the campsite fire And you have an electric guitar to play on a rock and roll stage and it's the same with the drums If you want to be a real drummer at one stage in your life, you want to you want to have a Electronic drum kit to practice and it's much easier to practice when you can Put your music on just put a stick into the drum set or even with bluetooth and you play to the music and Live I don't see the electronic drums yet. I mean I don't I will not say I never see them, but but I think it's a long way till you really have a Electronic drum kit on a stage playing jazz music or rock music. I mean Yeah, me personally when I go into a club and there's a band and the drummer is playing Rock of use music on a on an electronic drum kit I I leave because I I don't think that it works Yeah, but we see how it goes. I mean they put a lot of money and effort into Developing electronic drum kits and maybe one day we're gonna see something that is similar, but still I think acoustic drum kits. I love the smell. I love to see how the wood is is Worked on I I I just loved The feel of the drum. I loved it. Yeah everything about it I totally agree and I should say the person at home is who's sitting there listening to this who's who's playing gigs with an electric kit Do whatever works for you obviously and everyone has their own and fritz isn't right or wrong I mean you see that all the time where people use and I've worked in a lot of studio sessions Where sometimes a guy will bring an electric kit and it's like that's great There's we can just use midi and run it in and it's it makes it easy, but it has a different feel so But I think if you're playing drums, that's the key thing whatever you do And you know, we all have whatever we whatever gets you playing is important so Cool. Well fritz man. I can't tell you how awesome it has been to just hear the different stories and you know the the German and european side of these Things then we kind of branched off and and learned a lot of different things today. So Where can people find you like why don't you tell any german listeners who might be you know within driving distance Where they can find about out about drum house and all that stuff Oh, I mean i'm a i'm a local drum shop. I mean i'm not interested in doing business over Over mail order and things. I mean I really want to talk to the people but if somebody is in fryberg or the black forest area They will find me in the middle of fryberg just in the center of the town It's a small shop, but it's full of drums like the drum shops I experienced in my childhood when I went to forbs music in In london where you have a small room and you have drums everywhere till the roof and Yeah, we'd have a lot of stuff and we are located in the center of fryberg and if somebody of the listener wouldn't want to see and have a cup of coffee and A chat about drums then you're always welcome Man if someone out there is in the black forest listening to this You need to go and just tell fritz that you heard this episode Just so I can and then he'll tell me or somebody needs to tell me that That I reached one person Out there and that actually worked because that would be too cool. That's pretty specific Of a location to find someone but um, that would be awesome. So Cool. Well fritz um, thanks again for for doing this and being so flexible And uh, I don't think I mentioned it earlier. I had to postpone an hour I have a sick baby who I think is doing much better, but I was cleaning throw up off of a bunch of toys this morning from a baby So he's doing okay, but uh, yeah, thanks again for being so flexible and sharing all of your amazing knowledge with us and being on the show Yeah, thank you. It was very very pleasure for me to do that and i'm always interested to talk to drummers and um People from the industry and i'm think what you do is a great great thing and it brings Drummers from everywhere of the world together Thank you for doing something like that My pleasure and again a thank you to norbert from um, mine all who was just again become a very uh The show is just so I try to keep it very pure and educational and just like Straightforward history and I think a lot of people like norbert Um appreciate that and then suggest people like yourself. So thank you to uh to norbert and uh, and obviously thank you fritz We'll talk to you later. Okay. Thank you. Bye. Bye If you like this podcast find me on social media at drum history and please share rate and leave a review And let me know topics that you would like to learn about in the future Until next time keep on learning This is a Gwyn sound podcast