music stores, and my customer service people very apropos. We knew that if we worked on it [WM] When I first saw your new 1909 Black
are looking at me going, “What’s the Ringo kit?” we could come up with something, and being Sparkle, 6.5” x 14”, aluminum snare, it literally
I told them to just write down their name and as my Father and Grandfather and I were all took my breath away. It is absolutely gorgeous.
keep writing, and don’t worry about it (laughs). in the business together at the same time, and And the way you have laser cut the vent hole
That ended up triggering such an expansion for now I’m doing my own thing and starting to using your Roman numeral namesake III is one
us that we added quite a substantial addition get interest from a lot of drummers that I used of the coolest things I’ve seen in a long time.
to the factory, and shortly after that we went to work with as the artists’ relations person in Tell us about some of the mechanical and
to six days a week, twenty-four hours a day of the old days. It was just natural for me to say, design features of your snares including the
manufacturing drums, which is a lot of drums. “This is the sound of generations.” I’m the third multi-position snare strainer.
Even at six days a week twenty-four hours a generation of making these drums, and some day we were nine months behind on Black of these people have been playing them from [Bill] Five years ago, I had a massive change
Oyster Pearl kits. the first generation. So that came together from and upheaval in my life. I had gone through a
my partner Kip, and I love that tagline. divorce, and as I said before I was out of the
[WM]
“WFLIII
Drums,
the
Sound
of
music business, and I was working an office
Generations”, is your company slogan. Can
you tell us about this and your family’s legacy in
drums? You are the only Ludwig that continues
to make drums after over 100 years.
[Bill] Yes, that’s true. My partner and I were
working on a tagline, and the one before was
“The most famous name on drums”, which was
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January 2020
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