Do You Start Big or Small (Tom Tuning)

[areFish]

When you tune your toms do you start with your smallest tom and work down or your largest tom and work up? Bonus question: Do you tune the reso or batter first?

When I'm tuning all the toms, I tune them in this order, 16, 14, 12, 10. I tune the reso first then the batter.

[Xoferif09]

I start with my biggest tom, to the smallest. I don't want to wind up coming to the floor tom and having to either tune it so low I get a muddy sound, or having to go back through and tune all the other toms higher so they fit together. I tune batter to reso.

[pastor_bob]

On my Catalina Maple kit, my 10" tom is the one that is the most finicky, so I start there and get the tone I want - isolating the heads, and then tuning them the same. After I get the 10" tom right, I tune the toms in fourths.

With the 4 piece Catalina Elite kit, it doesn't seem as critical, but I start with the 12" tom just because it's my habit now to start with the smallest 1st. The next time I'm tuning that kit, I might just start with the 14" just to see where things end up.

[ZildjianKid234]

Never really thought about it. I always start with my highest tom, batter side, then go reso and work my way down. Maybe I'll try to switch it up now

[DrummerD]

When you tune your toms do you start with your smallest tom and work down or your largest tom and work up? Bonus question: Do you tune the reso or batter first?

When I'm tuning all the toms, I tune them in this order, 16, 14, 12, 10. I tune the reso first then the batter.

I typically start with the 16 and then work my way up to the 10. However, my last tuning, I started with the 10 and worked my way down to the 16. It worked out well for me.

I always tune the Reso's first.

[jazzkat]

When you tune your toms do you start with your smallest tom and work down or your largest tom and work up? Bonus question: Do you tune the reso or batter first?

When I'm tuning all the toms, I tune them in this order, 16, 14, 12, 10. I tune the reso first then the batter.

I do the same. Ideally I would start 22, 16, 14, 12, 10 in perfect 4ths

[wolvie56]

I tune with my toms off the kit starting with the reso side using a turntable, then the batters. After they are tuned up to the sound I want, I put them back on the kit. I have an 8", 10" 12" 13" 14" floor, and a 16" floor set-up right now. As I feel that the 13" is the most important tom and the the one I use the most, I fine tune that one first. Then go up or down accordingly.

[groovearteest]

i start with low tom but not always, and I do the batter first. On my old kit i didnt even use reso heads i pulled them off, but on my home and church kit, I dont even always tune the reso heads depending on what im doing to them.

[Northern Redneck]

I start with whatever drum is hardest to get a good sound out of and then tune the rest of the kit around it. I isolate the heads and tune batter then reso.
But tbh with my Superstars they only need tuning when I put on new heads or change rooms. otherwise its just the occasional tweaking if a drum sounds off.

[Russ]

I like to tune up the reso first, that way I can keep hitting the batter as I tune up and hear when the two sides match up. When I do tune I usually start with snare and kick, because those are the two drums I use the most. I like to prioritize, whatever i'm going to use i'll tune up but if I don't I won't bother.

[Riouel]

When you tune your toms do you start with your smallest tom and work down or your largest tom and work up? Bonus question: Do you tune the reso or batter first?

When I'm tuning all the toms, I tune them in this order, 16, 14, 12, 10. I tune the reso first then the batter.

+1 big to small and reso to batter

[inthpktplayer]

Big to small and reso first.

[Pearl MCX Man]

Same here smallest and resos always first.

[doctor dirt]

Bass drum first and usually at the sound check so its tuned mic'ed and live. Then the smallest to the largest. I never use more than 2 up & 1 down so the differences between the toms isn't drastic I prefer a tight focussed sound with not a huge seperation between them.
I also tune to the drum shell tone so the drums dictate how the tuning begins. If thats done first you eliminate rings and overtones from drum to drum. This week I'll be going back to a 4 pc kit that will have Bop sizes so the 8x10 and 14x14 will need to be slightly lower than their timbre natural pitch. I'm hoping the die casts are an addition because sometimes they detract from certain shells. We'll see!!!

Always take your time tuning and find the sweet lug or lugs that really make a difference in the tuning of a particular drum. Doc.

[Grazza]

Big to small and batter first.

[Drumbledore]

I vary my set ups quite a bit, but generally, for the main set I pick the toms out of a choice of an 8", 10", 12", 13", 14" and 16". What I do is tune the 8" fairly high (not quite timbale-like, but still nice, high pitched and ringy), then tune the 16" floor tom as low as possible without sounding flappy. Then all the other drums will sort of fall into pitches in between those two. I start by getting the batter and resonant heads fairly even (usually I have Remo Clear Ambassadors on top and bottom, so this is easily achieveable). Once all heads are even, then I'll start to tweak around so that the drums sound right for the room or enviroment I'm playing in. With this set of toms, I have the following configurations I like to use: 8", 10", 12", 14" (rack as a floor tom) and 16" floor...8", 10", 12" 13" & 14" (last two are racks used as floors)... 10" 12" & 14"...10", 12" 13" (as rack tom) & 16" floor... 10", 12", 13" and 14" (last two as 'floor toms')...8", 10", 13" & 14" (last two as 'floors')...10" as a single rack tom with 13" & 14" 'floors', 12" as a single rack tom with 14" and 16" 'floors' or 13" as a single rack and either a single or two 16" floors (the one extra tuned a little lower). Once I've picked a particular set up for a situation, one or two toms will be tweaked a little higher or lower, I do this a lot wïth the 13" tom, as it gets paired up with the other lower toms. To this kit I will occasionally add a few little extras such as timbales, mini timbales, roto-toms or octobans, these I would tune up or down only after tweaking the kit toms first, but usually I get them tuned a lot more ringier, or in the case of the octobans, various pitches for a high one for the shortest length (8" deep), right through to a deep throaty sound for the 22".

That's the main kit. I also have one kit which I fitted with Pinstripe heads as batters (Ambassador clears on bottom)- a 12" rack tom and a 16" floor tom. Just a straight out four-piece kit. The floor tom's tuned first......nice and deep sounding - it should hit you in the guts, soundwise) whilst the rack tom has a medium tuning, not dead and too low for it's size, but not high either. This kit just gets used now and then for heavier stuff like punk, but you can even use it for a blues or rock gig.

Then another kit's completely different - that one has all Coated Ambassadors all the way around the batter heads, Clears on the bottom, Coated Ambassador on the bass drum batter head and Fiberskyn resonant. This tuned up like a 1950's jazz bebop set (think Max Roach). The snare's like a biscuit tin....tight! The bass drum, tuned wide open, is just a little lower tuned than the floor tom on my main kit (this bass drum is 18" diameter). As far as the toms go, once again I tuned the 8" rack tom, then went to the lowest, the 14" floor tom, got that the lowest, then the other two toms were tuned accordingly. More often or not, I'll just use the 10" rack tom and 14" floor tom. So I don't go completely ascending or descending in pitch when it comes to toms, I try to find the high and low range limits and then get all of a kit's toms to fall in between those two ends.

And as for the Trixon Co.cktail set? Well, that's another can of worms, that's where the tuning rule-book gets thrown out, lol.

[marko138]

Smallest drum first. Batter first.

[Kazaamski]

Small tom to big tom. I use about the same tensioning on all my drums and get a pretty consistent result from drum to drum.

[jafo]

Bass drumfirst. Then smallest tom to largest. Reso first then batter.

[MartyM]

small to large excluding BD...I do that first.

[groovearteest]

If my reso heads are fine then i just go to tuning the batter. but if my drums get out of tune(which seems to not happen often) then i tune the reso first now that i think of it. then I tune the batter and keep hitting while im tuning it to see where im at, thinking about it now though, i mainly tune the mid tom first then tune the others around it because the mid tom seems to be the hardest to tune.

[Olimpass]

I usually start with biggest to smallest, reso to batter but end up going back and fourth with this because I might want a certain tone on whatever the high tom is not counting anything higher than a 12". But sometimes if there is a thirteen involved (for instance with a 12" in a 5pc.), I think they're difficult to tune as mentioned.