8-sided drum frame made of spruce wood

After several requests from you, we have decided to include drum frames in our program. The special thing about our frames is that we make them ourselves from local spruce wood.

The wood is carefully dried for several years, we use locally felled wood, directly from the forest that surrounds us!

If in stock, we also make them from rustic old wood. Don’t worry about worm marks, the wood is technically well-dried and, in the case of reclaimed wood, decades old. Nothing is alive anymore!

The real drum frames are actually bent and shaped from a wooden slat using heat and moisture. We may tackle this soon, if time permits.

Until then, our high-quality drum frames are available as 8-corner / octagon.

Drum frame properties

• Diameter: Measured from corner to corner – sizes 30-55cm*.
• Frame height: 7cm
• Frame thickness: 1.2 cm
• Wood: spruce (locally felled, carefully dried)
• Edges: rounded/broken
• The individual segments are glued together and reinforced at the joints by an external spring so that the shearing forces caused by the drum head tension do not destroy the frame

*This measurement may vary slightly as each frame is individually handmade.

 

In the product pictures you will find our own drum, which is made with such a drum frame. This picture is for illustrative purposes only, so that you can imagine what your drum might look like.

 

Tips for making a drum

Depending on the type of tension you choose, you must select a drum head that is larger than the diameter of the drum.

If we take our drum as a starting point, a drumhead of the following size was used:

• Diameter 55cm + (2x(1.2cm + 1.2cm) [Stärke der Stege des Rahmens]) + 2x7cm [Höhe des Rahmens)] + 2x3cm (protrusion from the inside of the drum, where the tension of the lacing acts) = approx. 80cm

If you want to make a Siberian shaman drum with this drum frame, you will need a rawhide with a diameter of at least 75 cm. You also need approx. 13m of cord with a width of 1cm for the lacing.

Deer, wild boar or horse are usually used. Every rawhide has its own sound. We also offer individual cutting of drumheads and rawhide cords.

Hirsch is sonorous. Also wild boar, although here the skin is quite rigid, which is noticeable in the sound.

Horse is thicker and therefore has a deeper sound. May seem a little too muffled for some. Beef scar can be used as an alternative to horse. It’s a very juicy sound.

Water the skin well. The cords must also be well soaked during processing.

The rest is your craftsmanship…

Care

Like any musical instrument, this drum must be handled with care. Do not expose to direct sunlight for too long. This puts too much strain on the eardrum.

Prolonged moisture (without subsequent good drying) can warp the drum frame, the drum head can lose sound or even start to mold (our drum heads are all naturally dried and depilated without chemicals, as they should be). Equally large temperature jumps can also affect the lacing and the stability of the eardrum.

The eardrum can also be treated with oil/beeswax (as for shoe care). Not too much, so that it doesn’t get greasy. This makes the shaman drum more resistant to moisture.

The drum frame, provided it is covered by the drum head, does not require any special care. If the rawhide does not completely cover the frame, the wood can also be treated with oil (e.g. linseed oil) every few years and allowed to dry out well.

Let’s put it this way, if you use the drum normally, keep an eye on it to ensure that it doesn’t remain in extreme conditions for too long, look after it and love it, it will do its job for a lifetime.

 

Miscellaneous

Drums are the original instrument. This type of frame drum is still used today by shamans in Siberia. Knobs are added to the drum on the frame which have a specific meaning. A carved wooden shaman (Altai region) is usually incorporated into the lacing on the back. Sometimes loops, cords, shells, metal discs or bones are incorporated. All of this always has an individual meaning and benefit on the journey to the ancestors.