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Ceramic drums

Alistair Whyte speaks about his range of musical vessels.

What made you decide to make ceramic drums?

Initially I was influenced by Judy Lorrain's ceramic drums many years ago when I was still a student, however recently a drum maker (in wood) approched me to make him some bases. He explained that many of the Northern African Drums were originally made in ceramic and he showed me an example or two. This began my exploration, and initially under his guidence, I began to make drum bases. However he moved out of the area and I decided to learn to put skins on as well. The skins are African goat that I purchased from an importer in Melbourne.

What makes ceramic material different to wood or metal in percussion?

Ceramic drums have wonderful resonance, however the shape is also a most important factor in the quality of the sound. Also being hand made, even very similar drums all have their individual sound. This is most likely the same for wooden drums.

What kind of music suits your drums?

That is probably very much up to the individual drummer, however they are in the jembei tradition. The middle of the drum sounds quite different to the edge. Depending on how you play you can extract quite a variation of sound.

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