Below are some worthwhile places on the web to see and learn about vintage drums.
If you’ve got a site that you think should be represented here (or if you hate the way I’ve described your website!), please let me know through my contact page.
Cooper’s Vintage Drums – Mark Cooper’s website showcases his fine drum collection, and has a ton of great vintage drum reference information, history and photos as well.
Not So Modern Drummer – the original vintage drum print magazine has gone online. A great blog and gathering place for some of the best collectors and drum photos.
Drum Sellers – Not So Modern Drummer’s spinoff marketplace website.
Vintage Drum Forum – one of the best and oldest online message boards for vintage drum talk.
Drum Archive – a reference site boasting a large collection of scanned pdf vintage drum catalogs.
Drum Forum – another large online message board, more focus on modern stuff here.
Vintage Drum Guide – a sister site of Vintage Drum Forum is another reference site with a god selection of pdf catalogs.
Vintage Cymbal Guide – VDF’s other sister site is devoted to vintage cymbal information.
Vintage Drum Center – a store site with a plethora of good articles on badges and serial numbers, and some deep dives into specific drums.
Hide Hitters – Winnie Mensink’s site showcases lots of photos of old drum gear, and features a shop as well.
Rebeats – this publishing company puts out many of the most authoritative books about vintage drums and drum history, including all the Rob Cook books.
Boston Drum Builders – Lee Vinson’s blog features well-written deep dives into the Boston drum building scene at the turn of the 20th century.
Olympic Drums – Bill Wanser and Scott Colner run this store and archive site, focusing on collector-grade drums and orchestral instruments from the 1900s through 30s.
Vintage Drum Talk – Jim Messina’s site has interviews, photo galleries and great in-depth articles featuring specific drums from collections such as Mike Curroto’s.
Joey Boom – Joe Mekler’s site features his own skilled restorations and a focus on his extensive collection of wooden-lugged drums of the WWII years.
Kelli Rae Tubbs – Kelli is a drummer, percussionist and drum historian. She produces fine instructional videos on drum and percussion history.
“Sir” Alan Drums – Alan Buckley’s museum and store site features some of the most fascinating and obscure drums on the entire internet. My personal favorite online drum museum.
Vintage Olympic – a British website devoted to the Olympic brand.
Oldrums – Emmanuel Giraudon is a skilled restorer and collector of high-end drums located in France. His site features his work on many intriguing European drums.
Jazzband.fr – a French language site and blog devoted to the drum set (batterie) in France. Features a rare exhaustive list of French drum makers and sellers of the 20th century.
Star Drums – a German-based site devoted to the Japanese Star factory and brand of the 60s and 70s.
Drum Museum – a fascinating Hungarian-run website with an astounding array of photos of obscure European-made drum sets, unseen anywhere else.