# The kit — pieces and limbs

Set the throne, the heights, and the grip on How to sit before you chase a
sound. Both pictures are a regular kit, from the seat you play in. Kick in the
middle, snare in front of your left hand, three toms, and three cymbals:
hi-hat, crash, and ride. The hi-hat is on your left. Your right hand reaches
across to it.

## An acoustic kit

![Line drawing of an acoustic kit from the player's seat](images/acoustic-kit.png)

Labels, from the seat: crash and hi-hat on the left, high tom, snare, mid
tom, ride, floor tom on the right, kick in the middle.

Line drawing by [Clngre](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Clngre~commonswiki),
[CC BY-SA 3.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/). Flipped so
the hi-hat sits on your left.
[Source](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Drum_kit_illustration.png).

## An electronic kit

Same eight pieces. The pads stay quiet until the box on the left, the module,
turns a tap into the sound of that drum or cymbal. Your feet still play the
two pedals.

![A small electronic kit from the player's seat](images/electronic-kit.jpg)

Photo by RethoricalCheese,
[CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).
[Source](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Basic_drumset.jpg).

Click a name, on the picture or in the buckets, to hear that piece alone.
A cymbal is written ×. A drum is a round note. The staff map is on the first
groove.

## Hands

Three buckets. In the groove the hands split. In a fill, both hands move.
Which hand plays which tom is on Fills.

- **Left hand — snare.** The backbeat, usually 2 and 4.
- **Either hand — high tom, mid tom, floor tom.** Not the groove. What you play
  instead of it, in a fill. The hands take turns, right hand first.
- **Right hand — hi-hat, ride, crash.** The hat is the clock. The ride is the
  same job, longer. The crash marks a landing.

## Feet

Two buckets.

- **Right foot — kick.** The floor. Lands with the bass.
- **Left foot — hi-hat pedal.** Holds the hats shut. This foot also plays the
  second kick of a double pedal. This room does not teach that. It is coming.

The right hand crosses over to the hat while the left stays on the snare. If that
feels wrong you are probably left-handed: mirror it, nothing else changes.

## Self-check

- Name the five pieces and the limb for each
- Four kicks that sound like each other
- Four relaxed left-hand snare hits
- Hat held shut by the left foot while the right hand plays it