CA1209831A

CA1209831A - Musical drums

Info

Publication number: CA1209831A
Application number: CA000411303A
Authority: CA
Inventors: Edward N. Peters; Michael G. Salvador
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1982-09-13
Filing date: 1982-09-13
Publication date: 1986-08-19

Abstract

ABSTRACT

The present invention relates to a musical drum in which the notes on the drum have a rectangular configuration such that they are tuneable to vibrate in a manner to pro-duce clear and accurate note sounding upon striking of the drum.

Description

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The present invention relates to a drum having Musical notes which are sounded upon striking of the drum.
BACKG~OUND OF TH~ INVENTION
There are presently available various different types of drum systemsO One of those systems includes a drum ar-rangement in which the drum surface is divided into a number of musical notes. Accordingly, one can sound different mus-ical notes by striking different regions on the drum's sur-face.
In these prior structures where a plurality of musicalnotes are found on one drum, the notes are generally formed with a very random or haphazard configuration.
It has been found that notes with this non-distinctive distribution and without specified configuration may not produce a consistent note sounding from one playing of the drum to the next. Furthermore, the different notes may not be sounded properly relative to one another.
SUMMARY OF THE PRESENT INVENTION
~O The present invention provides a drum which is adapted to mitigate the drawbacks found in the prior art structure.
More specifically, the present invention provides a drum, having a musical note bearing surface which includes rect-angular notes which are tuneable to have the harmonic modes of each individual note dominate the inharmonic modes.
BRIEF DISCUSSIO~ OF THE DRAWINGS
The above J as well as other advantages and features of the present invention will be described in greater detail according to the preferred embodiments of the present in-vention in which Figures 1 through 6 are all top plan views ,~

1 of different drum arrangements according to various pre-ferred embodiments of the present invention.

DET~ILED DESCRIPTIO~ ACCORDING TO THE
PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS OF T~E PRESENT INVE~TION
Each of the figures in the drawing shows a full drum system with the number of drums varying from one figure to the next. The minimum number of drums in a system is one, as shown in Figure 1, and the maximum number of drums in a system is 12 as shown in Figure 6. Both the Figure 1 and the Figure 6 systems, as well as the systems of Figures 2 through 5, include all twelve musioal notes comprising musi-ical notes A, Bflat, B, C, Csharp, D, Eflat, E, F, Fsharp, G
and Gsharp, with these notes being well known in the art.
What is common to all of the drum systems of Figures 1 through 6 is the inclusion of notes which are shaped for tuning to vibrate at the harmonic modes of the notes produc-ing accurate note sounding upon striking of the notes. This tuning is done by either increasing or decreasing the ten-sion of the note region on the drum surface by ha~mering.
In the systems of Figures 1 through 5, there are two types of notes including peripheral notes, generally indi-cated at 1, 5, 11~ 17 and 21 as well as interior notes gen-erally indicated at 3, 7, 13, 19 and 25 in the respective figures. The configuration for the peripheral notes is in the shape of an annulus of a sector which is a rectangle impolar coordinate, whereas all o~ the interior notes have a rectangular configuration in rectangular coordinate~s.
Both of these configurations have a very neat and defined border region which enables the -tuning described above.
In the arrangement of Figure 6 where each drum repre-1 sents one note and one note only, there are no interior notes. However, consistent with the earlier embodiments, each of the notes 29 on the note bearing surface of the drums is again shaped as an annulus of a sector for tuning to produce accurate note sounding upon striking of any of the drums.
A further feature of the present invention is that the note groupings for all of the drum systems shown in the drawings have a regular note interval which produces note soundings which are distinctive from one note to the next.
This is accomplished by setting the notes up on the drum surface where the vibration frequency for consecutive notes is at a constant ratio. For example, in Figure 1 the ratio of musical note G to musical note G is the same as the ratio of musical note G to the musical note D, which is the same as the ratio of musical note D to musical note A etc. con-tinuing around the drum. This concept of a regular note in-terval continues, although the ratio is differen-t, in Fig-ures 2 through 6. The advantage of the regular note inter-val is that it very much simplifies playing of the drumssince a regular note interval provides unlike prior art ar-rangements, a systematic positioning of the notes on a single drum or a number of drums where more than one drum is in a system .
Still a further feature of the drum system of the present invention is that each of the drums includes a num-ber of note groupings with that number being dividable equally into 12. The number of note groupings on each drum is dependent upon the number of drums in the system. The ~0 drum of Figure 1 includes 12 note groupings. Both of the ~l2~r~83~

1 drums in Figure 2 include 6 note groupings; the 3 drums of Figure 3 each include 4 note groupings; the 4 drums of Fig-ure ~ each include 3 note groupings; the 6 drums of Figure 5 each include 2 note groupings and the 12 drums of Figure 6 each include a single note grouping. This again results in a very systematic layout for each of the drum systems to ar-rive at an accurate note sounding of any of the groupings in each of the drums.
As has been described above, all of the individual drums, according to the preferred embodiments of the present invention are laid out in a manner to enhance mucical note clarity for maximizing drum tone and although various pre-ferred embodiments of the present invention have been des-cribed herein in detail, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that variations may be made thereto with-out departing from the spirit of the invention or the scope of the appended claims.

Claims

THE EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION IN WHICH AN EXCLUSIVE
PROPERTY OR PRIVILEGE IS CLAIMED ARE DEFINED AS FOLLOWS:

1. A drum having a musical note bearing surface and in-cluding notes having a rectangular configuration, said con-figuration being one which enables tuning of each note to produce clear and accurate note sounding from said drum upon striking of the notes.

2. A drum having a musical note bearing surface and in-cluding peripheral and interior notes each having a config-uration which allows tuning for harmonic mode dominance which produces clear and accurate note sounding from said drum upon striking of the notes, the configuration for said peripheral notes being a sector of an annulus which is a rectangle in polar coordinates, the configuration for said interior notes being rectangular in rectangular coordinates.

3. A drum as claimed in claim 2 including different musi-cal notes on said note bearing surface, said different musi-cal notes having a regular note interval.

4. A drum as claimed in claim 3 including all twelve musical notes on said note bearing surface.

5. A drum system comprising all twelve musical notes and including a plurality of drums each of which is provided with a musical note bearing surface, each musical note bear-ing surface including notes having a rectangular configura-ation, said configuration being one which enables tuning for harmonic mode dominance which produces clear and accurate note sounding from said drums upon striking thereof.

6. A drum system as claimed in claim 5 including 12 drums in said system with each drum being provided with a note distinctive to that drum, the notes in each drum being shaped as a sector of an annulus.

7. A drum system comprising all twelve musical notes and including a plurality of drums each of which is provided with a musical note hearing surface including peripheral and interior notes, said peripheral notes being shaped as a sector of an annulus and said interior notes being shaped as a rectangle, the shapes of both said peripheral and said in-terior notes being such as to enable tuning for dominance of harmonic mode of each note which, upon striking of the notes, produces clear and accurate note sounding from the drums.

8. A drum system as claimed in claim 7 including group-ings of different notes of each drum surface, said groupings having regular note intervals.

9. A drum system as claimed in claim 8 including a number of note groupings on each drum, the said number being one which is dividable equally into the number 12.