When do I need to replace the drum heads?

When I listened to a band rehearsal of a drum student of mine not so long ago, I noticed that he had never changed the skins on his drum set since he bought it. Accordingly, they sounded dull, flat and had lost all resonance.

As a relatively inexperienced drummer, it is very difficult to determine the right time to change the skins - unlike, for example, the guitar, where you usually change the strings only when they break. Drumheads are almost impossible to destroy and in any case you should replace them before! This blog post is intended to explain, based on a few indicators, when it makes sense to change drumheads. Since every drummer has his own tricks, I also asked other experienced drummers about this topic. The answers were all very similar. The skins on the drums should be replaced when

• A studio visit is pending. All agree that the skins must be replaced before a studio visit anyway, because you want to achieve the best possible sound in the studio, which is only possible with new skins.
• Dents are visible or the coating is fading. The easiest way is to look at external signs of wear of the skins. Dents or even wear of the coating on the skin are signs that the sound is no longer optimal.

• The sound is no longer right. More experience is needed to hear when the skins no longer sound good. For this, the following adjectives can be helpful: The drum sounds "tired", "cold", "plastic-like", "dead", "flat", "tinny" or the resonance of the drum is fading.
• The skins are no longer tunable. When the skins sound no longer respond to different tensions of the screws.

Generally, drumheads are replaced too little because the right time is not recognized. Therefore, it is worth addressing this issue in drums lessons, because a good sound is motivating!

Thanks for helping Lukas Mantel, Francesco Gasparini and Peter Haas.