Vintage Ludwig Logo

I've just finished roughing out a vintage Ludwig logo for my old 1930 Ludwig bass drum.









This logo is similar to one that features on the Aero Kraft label that I found inside the drum.
I do this all free hand the same way I used to do when I was a sign writer and graphic artist in the 1970's and 80's because I have no skill with any computer graphic program.

Next step is to pounce the logo on to the calf skin and paint it on.

I'm still deciding on whether to paint a graphic on the whole skin or not.

I've seen some beautiful vintage, bass drum skin graphics that strongly tempt me to do it.

More later.

I found a 16 inch Meinl medium crash cymbal this week to add to my collection of bits and pieces. I now only have to pick up a 14 inch floor tom tom and a cymbal stand from a friend next month and I have the whole set up complete. I can't wait!

Once it's all together I'll set it up and take some images with my cymbal set up and post it all on this blog.

Harmen

Vintage bass drum pedal

This is a vintage bass drum pedal gifted to me recently by a local business man who learned that I was restoring an old Ludwig bass drum.

I think that the footpad reveals that it is a Ludwig interpretation of a Fraser, patented bass drum pedal from around 1920.

The pedal is much worn and corroded but by no means beyond restoration.

I will begin by removing the badly corroded components, clean up the brass, replace the spring and link yolk. The badly worn pivots and fulcrums I will fill with braze and re drill. After a refit of all new components, screws, etc, I will have the unit nickel plated.

The Hoovers.

If you think Hoovers suck you should see us blow!

"Tim Heraud's the name, the dog's called Bulla" said the King country cat and the black dog crouching on my kitchen floor in Grey lynn. "I heard you play drums?"
Not again I thought, (still no drum kit). "Our drummer just quit but you can use hers, her name is Fiona... do you mind if we call you Fiona to save confusion?"

By now we were living in a beaten up villa (ex brothel) in Auckland having sold the Helensville property and settled our affairs there.
I had a job as a sign writer / production manager and as luck would have it two of my colleagues owned drum kits. I bought a half size Aria kit from Mykie (pictured) and later a black Tama Rockstar kit from Mark James.




















The Hoovers at the Kiwi Tavern: Stuart Hoover: Guitars and BV's, Harmen (Fiona) Hoover: Drums and BV's Tim Hoover: Guitar, Vocals and songs and Early Dave Hoover: Double bass and BV's.

Stewart Shepherd, Harmen Hielkema, Tim Heraud, Dave Wishart.

To read a bit more about the Hoovers from a different perspective try this link.

The Gumdiggers Bush Band

Some time later after the birth of our son Robert in 1984 I began to feel the need to establish roots for my young family. I sold my drums and spent several years working in the building industry to build up the capital for our first home. We eventually settled in Helensville , Northwest of Auckland where we bought our first house. By then our twin boys had come along (though unfortunately one died in a mysterious cot death at the young age of three weeks).
It was in Helensville where our daughter was born.
All this time I had ignored my musical urges. Whilst running the local second hand shop I came across the best drum kit I was ever to own. It was an early '70's Slingerland kit. I joined a casual group of local musicians who played Albert King style blues which I thoroughly enjoyed. John Martin on bass and Allan Stevens on guitar, both were very accomplished players. As I recall we made a reasonable fist of that ouevre for skinny, privileged white boys
Financial difficulties saw me sell that beautiful kit and music was again off the menu.
The one day I came into the shop and was welcomed by the ephemeral sound of an ocarina.
From behind an aisle of second hand items popped up an impish young Dutch musician who had heard that a musician of Dutch decent owned the local second hand shop. Marcus Goddefroi played Swedish key fiddle, ocarina, a self made violin, piano, harmonica, piano and button accordion and bones, (all instruments equally well!). Marcus introduced me to Bill and Kath Worsfold who were seeking a percussionist and vocalist for their band the Gum Diggers Bush Band. I sadly admitted that I no longer had a kit of drums. Bill encouraged me to try playing a tea chest bass, lager phone, bones and an old snare drum. I quickly took to the eccentric, authentic old New Zealand music that Bill collected. I learned to sing in harmony and was soon gigging regularly with Bill Worsfold on classical/flamenco guitar, Kath on accordion, whistles and vocals, Bob Uhe on violin and mandolin and Marcus.































The Gumdiggers Bush Band. Helensville, 1989.
Left to right: Harmen Hielkema: Tea Chest Bass, vocals. Bill Worsfold: Acoustic Guitar, Vocals. Kath Worsfold: Accordion, whistles, vocals. Bob Uhe: Mandolin, Violin, vocals.

That was me thoroughly fast tracked into the New Zealand folk scene.
I adored playing that tea chest bass, I could not put it down, I loved the close vocal harmonies we rehearsed endlessly. As I look back I see how well this experience set me up for what was to follow.

Harmen

A new title image for my blog

The past is the past.
















My previous blog title photograph (above) was of me at age 26. I was playing a chrome on fibre glass, Fibes kit with Ziljan cymbals. At that time I was playing in a cover band called the Voyeurs with Marc Dombowski (guitar and vocals), Paul Martin (Guitar and vocals), Gary Harvey and Lee Cooper who alternated on bass and vocals. We covered Rolling Stones and Iggy Pop material playing at various venues around greater Auckland.

Previous to that, in the late 1970's, I was active playing drums with a 3 piece band doing receptions and backing acts like Frankie Rowles and Billy T James through the Hegan Entertainment Agency.

This black and white image was captured at the Orewa Town Hall in 1983 by a photographer colleague, Rebecca ? who worked with me at the Hibuscus Coaster news paper.

A clip from "The Jews Brothers Band" website's "History" page

The Jews Brothers Band at Rakinos Cafe, High Street, Auckland 2001
Hershal: (Piano Accordion, Vocals), Harmen Hielkema: (Vocals, Bass), Linn Lorkin: (Vocals, Melodica), Kelvin Roy: (bass trumpet, vocals)

"Within a few weeks we recruited another extraordinary and eccentric musician ... Harmen Hielkema (dubbed by Linn, the "Dutch clutch" and sometimes the "Friesian 'nesian"), who played the most amazing instrument of all, known Down Under as the tea-chest bass, a variant of the wash-tub bass often heard with jug bands. I didn't want a normal bass in the band (though eventually when Harmen left the band we did go that route). But the sounds Harmen created on his tea-chest were just amazing and he often stole the show! People would just sit there dumbfounded at both the sound and the look of this monstrous looking instrument. Harmen was also a visual artist who did music as a hobby (for financial reasons) and eventually had to leave the band to become a teacher at AUT, teaching Spatial Design (at which point he was replaced by Peter Scott on the double bass ... see our artist page).
Harmen's bass and vocals feature on all the JBB albums except the Braeburn Sessions. As I write today, Harmen is now living with his wife Julie in the Hokianga region of Northland, New Zealand. Together they also organize regular house concerts. 09 405-7855."

Hershal

27" vintage bass drum

I've just finished restoring a lovely old 1935 mahogany bass drum.

This brand was distributed by S & T Adams and Son Auckland. The label reads "S & T Adams & Son Auckland" and is pasted on the inside of the shell.

From my online research I have been able to determine that Super Tone was an American brand name for instruments distributed by Sears & Roebuck. This Drum was manufactured in 1935 (marked in pencil by the maker inside the shell) by Leedy and Ludwig and imported into NZ.

Shell is 2 ply mahogany with 3 maple reinforcing rims, counter hoops are of maple.

The tension rods are Leedy and Ludwig and are bright nickel plated.

The drum is fitted with one calf skin and one mylar Tympani skin.

I believe that this drum could form tha basis for a 1930's style vintage drum "trap" set up or make a unique coffee table, lamp or illuminated sign.

I bought this drum many years ago, whilst on tour with the Jews Brothers, at an antique shop in Napier. The drum had been painted in light blue enamel with white painted counter hoops. It featured one original calf skin and one later calf skin of lesser quality.

I loaned this drum to my son when he was still at secondary school and together we created a kit from a variety of second hand components. He got 5 years of good use out of it before he returned it to me with some minor modifications. He had refinished the drum with an old "Lotto" decal left over from the old Team NZ Americas Cup campaign (of which he had been a member).

This was how the drum looked when it was returned to me.

































































After much scraping sanding and oiling, here's what it looks like now.

I had the tension rods re plated which has lifted the finished article to a whole new level.