Silent Drumming

A way to practice drumming anywhere silently for, pretty much, free! :)

Step 1 Materials and junk

What you will need:

Drumsticks
Tape, or fast drying glue
Scissors, or craft knife
An old mouse mat
A London After Midnight album (I prefer Phycho Magnet)

Comments

[dreamberry]

I started learning to drum by practicing on a couch cushion. Zero rebound, but extremely quiet.

[Akask]

You can take these on a plane. I took my drum pad and sticks on my trip to europe. On the way back I accidentally left them in my carry-on. Security looked at them, but they didn't take them away.

[Davvik]

Could you mute the kick with that?

[redsoxdrummer]

If you put a bunch af duck tape and coton and stuff on the pedal and kik litly it mufles prety wel

[Keeter]

If you want to mute a kick drum, the easiest way is to fill the inside with something. A couple pillows or a big fluffy blanket works best. Still makes noise, but not quite as much.

[abadfart]

i shove old winter jackets in it

[wiebevandomburg.hotmail.com]

i always do that , else it doesn`t sound very well

[Davvik]

I already have that in my Bass, to dampen the sound, but then if you are using the cusioned sticks then your bass will still be much luder by comparison

[Shut Up Now]

yea i already do that because i Hate an echoey bass drum.

[fldhkygoalie]

hah no. most drums still make noise felt tipped sticks or not. sorry mate

[Davvik]

I guess you missunderstood exactly what I meant, I didn't mean completely mute it, I know the felt tips wouldn't completely mute it. I just meant could you do it to the bass drum to make it a little quiter too?

[fldhkygoalie]

oh. well i guess adding padding would help. and it would help a lot on the cymbals

[Tomkatt]

suck it and see. as long as its a crap mousemat there nothing to worry about.

[fldhkygoalie]

for god sake mate how old are you? suck it and see? little childish now arnt we?

[Tomkatt]

I wasn't using it as an innuendo it is always used here merely as an inncocnt figure of speech. I think the true childishness lies with the one who turns it from an innocent figure of speech into an innuendo, don't you agree?

[fldhkygoalie]

then why use it when the word can be interpreted into an innuendo when you could just not open up that chance at the start and just use a different figure of speech?

[Tomkatt]

Because any use of language can be interperated to make innuendo it only depends on the interperator. Plus this is a website where true meanings would be understood, at least by most users.

[fldhkygoalie]

while i see what you mean by any figure of speech being able to be interperated as an innuendo, what other viewers would see the "correct" meaning of suck it and see?

[Tomkatt]

Well seeing how you're the only one who has mentioned it...

[fldhkygoalie]

well if you look up you may realize that the comment was directed at me. not the other ppl veiwing with page

[GnomeMaster]

STOP FEEDING THE TROLL MAN THAT MEANS HE WON!!!!! haha lol 2008

[Habacuc]

How to mute bass tom ?

[kneecaps]

what is a bass tom? are you referring tot e kick drum or floor tom?

[Habacuc]

I'm talking about the kick drum :)

[vindozer]

i took my sitcks on to a plane i didnt get them out but they got on w/ me

[speltbaker]

cool - drumstick mufflers! we've got a drummer in the family: guess who's gonna get a pair of these right away...

[awsomeinventor]

pretty neat idea. Great job.

[drummonkey92]

nice idea. im gona do this on the end of a couple of old telescopic arials so they'l fit in my pencil case when folded down. getting sticks outa your bag and playing on the table in a free lesson is generaly frowned upon in my school lol one other thing - do you lose much bounce when playing with these?

[lawizeg]

thats cool

[Ima_Pirate]

Yar. doesn't that defeat the purpose?
But It does help my slave captain practice his ominous drumming.
(Argh, that sounds gay⁾

[joejoerowley]

Hi, this is a good instructable but I dont like it because I don't think I could a accomplish 17 stroke rolls as easily. I would just play on the edge of the head, a practice pad with beads in the bottom or mute pads. Thanks for Ideas though.

[Tomkatt]

The whole point in this is to be a total cheapskate, you need to spend money on a good pad, this is free. its not great but it works

[KnittingFreak]

It's a good thought, but I hold my sticks so close together that I probably wouldn't even be able to do smooth paradiddles. Is this actually silent, or just very quiet (like playing on the floor, or a mute pad, like joejoerowley said)?

[Tomkatt]

It depends what you play on but its really really quiet on anything

[Sgt.Waffles]

It would be difficult to do rudiments, because of the extra weight on the front, and the giant obstructions. You go try to do alternating triple ratamacues with them and let me know what its like.

[Tomkatt]

Its pretty weightless,i dont suggest you keep this its just say, until you get a decent pad

[lemonie]

My mate Steve had a pad (almost certainly like joejorowley suggests), but this is much better, as you only need your sticks.
The only think I could think of to make this any better is to have screw-on tips (soft and hard) like Snooker cues. However, that's probably going to cause problems.

L