I was looking for one of these beautiful drums to add to my collection and found this one on drumsellers.com. I was able to contact George Lawrence who did a great job in helping me obtain it from a collector who was selling some of his collection
The second was the 100th Anniversary Black Beauty. “Often imitated but never duplicated, Ludwig set the standard for all others to follow with the Black Beauty. The 100th Anniversary edition, hand-engraved and numbered by master craftsman John Aldridge, is more ornately appointed than all others before it, and features the mark of three generations of Ludwig history. “Chief” Keystone badge”.
Johnny created a lot of interest back in the early 2000s with his acquisition of a stash of 600 + year old birch that had been discovered at the bottom of Lake Superior.
For a brief period of time Craviotto Drums partnered with C & C drums to offer a short run of snare drums and drum sets in various shades of real abalone shell material that was applied to the solid maple Craviotto shells.
i endorse Crocken Drum Sticks. No one else hand crafts sticks like these and nothing else feels like them. As Mr. Crocken says, they are fun to use. -George Lawrence
Here are three Lang/NSMD Gladstone engraved gold Triumphal prototypes (#s 1, 2, 3) from 2004-2005. I purchased these from John Aldridge who was the engraver of these snare drums. John’s company at the time, NSMD Co., also supplied the shells for these drums.
These three drums were ordered at the 2007 Chicago Vintage Drum Show. Master drum craftsman Johnny Craviotto (Craviotto Drums) teamed up with master drum craftsman Adrian Kirchler (AK Drums) to create the Craviotto Drums/AK Drums Diamond Series snare drums.
Brady Drums, made by Chris Brady and company, are revered worldwide for their fine craftsmanship, exotic Australian timbers, and most notably their wonderful and unique sound. Chris Brady, truly a drum building pioneer, introduced Jarrah, Sheoak, Wandoo, Spotted Gum, and other indigenous Australian woods into the vocabulary of drummers. Brady constructed these drums with ply, stave/block, and even solid shells.
Before Joe Partridge and I started the Famous Drum brand (“You must have heard of us - we’re Famous!”), I built three sets of custom painted drums for a catalog of what was to be the “Lawrence Drum Company” and had some great pics made of the shells. This was in the early mid 2000s when I was building drums at George’s Drum Shop. I abandoned the Lawrence badge name in favor of Famous, but these drums were never badged.
I started to conceptualize this many years ago following a glimpse of a SS Ludwig Timp-Tom trio set.
After making a trade with a fellow drummer and friend for a beautiful original set of Timps recently in 14”, 16” & 18” I got to work