How To Tune A Snare Drum

Starting with your tension rods on both the top and bottom being loose, you’ll want to hand tighten the tension rods simultaneously across from each other until they loosely touch the rim. Once they’re all touching the rim, (start with bottom drum head) you’ll want to use a drum key to turn about 1/4 turn and going strait across the drum (as shown in the video above) to avoid awkward tension and torque on the head. You’ll want to continue this process until there are no visible ripples in the head, and without over-tightening the head.

Once your bottom head is tight enough to get all of the ripples out, you’ll want to flip the snare drum over and begin taking the same steps as above (including the pattern of going across the drum). Continue at approx. 1/4 turn all the way around until the head starts to get fairly tight. Dependent on how you like the feel of your snare drum, I usually tighten until the stick will bounce naturally off of the head (it will sound like crap if you followed the steps right).

At this point, you’ll flip the snare drum over again and tighten the bottom a small amount at a time until the sound starts to clear up. You’ll have to repeat the process if you didn’t get it right, but once the bottom head gets tighter, you should be able to control the tone and amount of ringing, without messing with the feel you like on the top head.

How To Tune A Snare Drum