When I was leaning to drum, my percussion teacher (Alan Gaskin, if any of you are from Halifax, NS) used to invent percussion parts for ensemble using everything from wheel rims (with a ball peen hammer) to slapping two bits of broken bamboo together.

Since then, I've had this fascination with drumming on everything to see if I can get a "new" sound. I'm sure this is how someone introduced the cowbell to music! (oh, and by the way, it's good, but it needs....more cowbell!)

What have you "created" for your kit/sound?

On my kit I have used the following:

-two heavy gauge mixing bowls (6" and 8") mounted above cymbals
-a fire bell (let's just say...not a *purchased* fire bell...)
-2 saw blade stabilizers, stacked (6" discs to stabilize a table saw blade)
-I once had an entire octave of yoghurt containers, inverted, but they didn't last long...plastic ain't what it used to be.

And for "sticks"
--bamboo skewers (For the bbq) that have been epoxied into a broken drumstick shank and taped for stability)
--a plastic whisk...of the kitchen variety
--broken sticks with plastic "fans" on the end (made from an old antifreeze container)

Jonathan

Not too much on the kit, but in terms of "found objects as percussion:

• saw blade (the kind for a radial arm saw) - great ride cymbal bell sound
• (spent!) military shell casings
• (multiple) house keys strung up as wind chimes
• bundt cake pans (my wife won't go to kitchen stores with me any more)

And this one isn't mine - a builder in Iceland has crafted a few snare drums using car wheels as shells.  Fun stuff, at least for drum geeks like me.  

link to page with picture of shell and lugs

link to page with sound file - doesn't sound bad, IMHO

and another one with pic's

(The links take you to the ghostnote.net forums.)

Cool.  Add to this a plastic or wooden paint stirring tool.  Played with either the flat wide orientation to get a slap, or the edge to get more of a stick sound.  

And... the cardboard coat hanger pant protector things.  Soft sounds.  Don't last long though.  

Also...  rods played on your knee simulate a regular stick played on the closed hi-hat.  Well, sort-of.

Kitchen grater and a wire whisk as a scraper.  You get four different scraping sounds!

Stove burner bowls and rings.

And when I was a kid, metal trash can lids made "good" cymbals.

Strings of wife's beads (you need to remove about about three beads per one remaining to get a good vibration sustain) on a cymbal as a sizzler.  Not nearly as good as a stainless steel rivet though.

Wood blocks with sandpaper attached.

Bare hands.  Bare hands on a cymbal are felt mallets.  Bare hands on a snare thrown off is a conga or bongo.  Sorta.

Mike B.

We used a steel piece of railroad track struck with a hammer for anvil parts in HS band.  I have heard of an orchestra in my hometown used a shot gun (with blanks) fired into a coffee can to reproduce (with iffy results) the cannons in the 1812 Overture.  I accompianed a modern dance piece with an ensemble of toy instruments.  I played brushes on a cylindrical oatmeal carton as a 'snare', played a toy xylophone, blew a plastic whistle, rang a bike bell, and the piece de resistance was my Barney electronic bongos that we rigged with a 1/4 inch jack so that I could run it through effects and an amp.   All were bought at Toys R Us, pretty much.  I did another performance art piece where I rigged a large wooden shipping crate with a kick drum mike that I stomped on while I played beribau on top of it.  Not really a percussion instrument, but I also know a really expert syringe player (plays it like a flute).  I also play a mean sauce pan, I've been told.    

I've seen that a couple of times lately. Seems very handy/reversible trick.

Promark is selling a cym. stand washer with the beads chain already attached.

That's a very cool idea! Not good-looking, but cool any way.

As I'm seeing it, that could represent an added value to any set up

I use wind chimes. On my big kit, in conjunction with a 40" Sabian Chinese gong, I have a large bamboo wind chime and three metal tubular wind chimes. One of the metal chimes is bronze, quite noisy cacophonic. The other two chimes are mellow, the biggest being 2" diameter aluminum which resonates for a long time. Also hanging around the central gong is a variety of indian brass bells and zils, a rack chime, and a bell tree, all of which are more traditional percussion than the wind chimes, but combined, all these sounds can keep me entertained playing them for 1/2 hour stretches. I really dig 'em, and my cats can come and play them too, usually in the middle of the night.

Oh, one last thing, I rigged a fan up on a timer, and now I can wake up to the sound of wind chimes.

Here is a great link to get some ideas: http://rhythmweb.com/homemade/index.html

Hi everyone, I'm new to these forums...  
Presently I don't play a "proper" drumset, just odd bits of percussion and found sounds miked and routed through a modular synth.  
At present I'm using:
3 spring coils (from vehicles and bed box-springs)
5 graduated steel mixing bowls
3 medium-sized clay flowerpots (suspended and struck with soft mallets)
an assortment of ceramic and metal plates
some "squeaky" kids' toys
several bells (presumably meant for decorative purposes)
bamboo and metal windchimes

That's awesome...    Do you have any recordings or pics of this monster?