There is much debate about skins for Tumbadoras and Bongos and other drums. The questions I get all the time are around thickness, type of animal and a few others. One other issue I have seen raised is a question of buying from a “hide house” or a custom drum maker as opposed to buying from a company like L&H.
I would first like to address why one should buy from a shop like L&H. We spend a lot more time dealing directly with the tannery on making sure we get the top grade. We make sure that the hides are proper for use on drums. Sure anyone can call a hide house ask for a section of rawhide and make a drum head. I caution you however they do not sell you what they sell to L&H nor do they understand the application. I am not even going to address the Mule/Cow other skin type issues. at the end of the day the reason you call L&H is that we have the contacts and we do the leg work. Its just like any other Biz….
People have been questioning if its ok to buy from the likes of Ritmo, Isla, SoS, ECT ECT… I saw leave them to what they do well build drums. They don't need to spend 30 min on the phone with you for a $40-$50 Skin when they have 8-10 month waiting periods. This is just my opinion BUT I'm sure some of the craftsman would agree…
Now on to selection of a skin. The answer can be as simple as people play on what ever is readily available and they make it sound great. But lets be honest we all want the best. L&H Percussion strives to provide the best. Its a very long and complex discussion around why some skins are very even and why some are not. Some hide houses use “ splits” and plane and buff to a very precise measurement. That's all well and good but we at L&H believe that this creates other issues that take the “ life” out of the skin. We start with raw skins that are only stretched and dried to our standards with a slight bit of finishing to make them feel ok to the hand. We then hand cut each round doing our best to ensure that there is little to no variation in thickness. Normal variations that do not affect tuning or the life of the drum or head are typically around .5mm.
There are a number of wrong opinions online being shared and I would caution anyone reading this take your questions to the experts. Call L&H or call another person who deals with the hides and the animal. We are the “Pros” when it comes to this.
If you ever have questions or what to get some help feel free to call us. We can offer you what we have seen work and help you formulate what should be best for you. We also stand behind our product and will work hard to satisfy our customers big or small.
