Summary: Sometimes drums need to be muffled slightly because they ring too much. Learn how to properly muffle toms and snare drums in this free video clip.
Jake Jorgenson has been playing for a nationally ranked drum line team for 5 years. He has been playing drums for 7 years performs in Utah band Brohana and teaches drums.read more
"There's a bunch of different types of muffling you can use for a head because right now, let's see where our snare is at. We've got a lot of overtones, and a lot of drummers hate overtones, absolutely hate them. I know I kind of sometimes do. To reduce that, you have - there's just many different developed ways of tuning. These are Evans E-rings, you can pretty much get these at any music, any drum store. They're pretty cheap for a whole set. And just, you can tell the difference in sound quality. It just totally brings out what you're hitting. It brings out the hit and not more of the sound. It just makes it - I'll show you the different - it just really muffles it a lot. There's many different types of muffling. You have your E-rings, Evans E-rings, I got one of those right here. You've got E-rings, and you have these clamps, you can actually clamp onto the side of the head. And you also have this putty-type substance, you just lay across and stick across the head. It just really dampens it. And just depends on what you like. And even, you can tune it how you want muffling to sound. It all affects how you want it to be tuned."
eHow Article: Tom & Snare Drum Muffling Tips