It’s merely beginning to set in that the father of the electric guitar, the pioneer of multi-track recording, and truly genius musician, Les Paul has passed away. Our deepest sympathy goes out to all the family, friends, and fellow fans of this legend here at Dixon Drums.

We were curious to find out who held down the rhythmical fort with Les Paul during his time with us over the years, and found some great drummers and percussionists.

Very little literature is readily available for all the studio drummers and personnel lineups in Les Paul’s early days, but we found the name of one of his first percussionists who was part of The Les Paul Trio in 1938 who also played bass, Ernie “Diarrhea” Newton.

In 1976, Les Paul teamed up with Guitarist Chet Atkins for the Grammy Award winning Chester and Lester album of which Larrie Londin played drums on the session.
In 2006, Les Paul at 90 years old released a two Grammy Award winning album called Les Paul & Friends: A Tribute To A Legend which included many great guest appearances from vocals to guitar to bass to harmonica to drums and percussion which included Vinnie Colaiuta, Shawn Pelton, Gordon Knudson, Abe Laboriel, Jr., Adam “LDB” Polatov, Kenny Aronoff, and Daniel Moreno. No wonder it won not only one, but two Grammys with that line up!
If you know of any great drummers that Les Paul played with or if you yourself got to play drums with him, feel free to leave a comment below to share your stories or info.

May Les Paul and his legacy live on forever in our hearts and souls!

Photo by flickr user Thomas Faivre-Duboz, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 2.0. deed.

NotSoModernDrummer.com hosted their 10th annual Snare Drum Olympics on July 27th. Dixon’s 6″ x 13″ model DS-0613-RWD Rosewood Snare ranked first in Cumulative Scoring and more importantly, ranked first for Blind Scoring, both in the Plywood Category. This drum received a 189 out of a perfect 200 score for the blind category! From NotSoModernDrummer.com:

In the objective blind judging the drums were played behind the judge’s backs for two to three minutes each, using the same series of rudiments, patterns and beats on each drum as the judges voted from 1 to 10 on five criteria; sensitivity, tone quality, dynamic range, rim sounds, and blend of the drum with the drum kit. The judge had no idea of the manufacturer or model of the drum and could not see it. They were told the sequence number of the drum, what the shell construction was, and the size. Otherwise the only thing they had to go on was their ears. A perfect score of 50 from each judge would equal a total score of 200.

We are proud to announce The Grand Prize Winner for our Dixon Drums “Drum Your Way to Hollywood” video contest. And…. the winner is……. (drumroll!)

Lou Mars playing at Herreid Music!

Congratulations Lou!

Lou will be flying to Hollywood, California later this month for an opportunity to play with a live band at world famous Westlake Studios in front of an A&R panel. Check out the panel:

Matt Messina: Composer for film and television, original symphonies and an active drummer. Recent composing credits include composer on movie “Juno” and new television show “the ex list.”

Mike Frondelli: is one of the leading lights of the industry’s quest toward high-resolution digital sound and a seasoned engineer/producer in his own right, he is a creative force in the music making world. Michael has recently worked on “The Plácido Domingo 40th Anniversary Gala”, mixed FarmAid and has been the audio producer for the 13 show, HDNet series On Stage at The World Cafe Live for HD Broadcast and DVD release, which includes artists, Living Color, The Rhett Miller Band, The Knack and Rita Coolidge. Additionally, Michael has recently recorded concerts for Chicago & Earth, Wind & Fire (Platinum), The Gram Parsons Tribute and Marianna Faithfull also for HD Broadcast and DVD release.

Bobby Owsinski: longtime veteran of the music industry, Bobby Owsinski has produced and composed for records, DVDs, motion pictures, and television shows. One of the first to delve into surround-sound music mixing, Bobby has worked on more than 200 surround projects and DVD productions for such diverse acts as Elvis, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Willie Nelson, Neil Young, The Ramones, and Chicago, among many, many others.

Mike Burns: Grammy nominated music producer, songwriter and owner of A&R Select – the leading Artist Development firm in Los Angeles.

Mark Bistany aka Moke: Formerly drummer Puddle of Mud, Hed PE, (he’s also willing to do a little drum session)…

Jim Stanek: Product Manager for Dixon Drums!

Nikki Nearing: Communications and Media Director of Kaman Music

This will be filmed and aired on the A&R Channel as a half hour special. He will also be receiving a Dixon Demon drumset!

Runners up, will each be receiving a snare drum and mad props for sounding so great!

Buffdood

Ukelalebomber

mattrobertson101

doughboystud09

jrmdrum15

Thank you to everyone that participated! We logged over 25,000 views in just a few short weeks for the contest. Way to go!

Best,

Jim Stanek
Product Manager