Adding percussion colour to your drum kit - a practical guide

Most of us will have at least considered adding a bit of flavour to our beats with percussion instruments, but what are the practical considerations if you want to move beyond augmenting your drum kit with the classics - cowbell, woodblock and standard tambourine?

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These already sound great, as ably demoed here by Andy of Thomann's Drum Bash channel, but they're far from the limit of your options if you want to get a bit more creative.

Kicking off with special tambourines which include on/off jingle switches and more, check out some more exotic percussive kit flavours in this run-through of what anybody can achieve by incorporating mini timbales, bongos or our personal favourite this week, a pandeiro drum to cook up your own unique signature set-up.

Bongos on a drum kit

(Image credit: Thomann Drum Bash)
Will Groves
Editor-in-chief

I'm lucky enough to be MusicRadar's Editor-in-chief while being, by some considerable distance, the least proficient musician on the editorial team. An undeniably ropey but occasionally enthusiastic drummer, I've worked on the world's greatest music making website in one capacity or another since its launch in 2007. I hope you enjoy the site - we do.