My friends, Allen and Gina Blaxton of Nashville have come up with a device that could solve a common problem for a lot of performing drummers. It’s called the Snare Skirt, a heavy cloth baffle with plastic hooks to attach to your snare drum. The purpose? To reduce the amount of snare drum volume going into the other mics in front of the drums by blocking the sound from the front of the snare drum. I did something similar to this with towels, packing blankets, and duct tape DYI in the past and I already knew this Snare Skirt would work just by looking at it online. Allen sent me one and I tried it. It Works! It works well. The volume reduction in front of the skirt is significant. It attaches to the bottom tension rods of the snare drum with simple hooks and hangs on the side that faces the audience. It literally blocks some of the sound waves that emanate from there. How much blockage? It is somewhat dependent on the environment of the performance; sound absorption or hard reflections of the surfaces behind and around the drum set, etc. In my funky garage/drum laboratory which has a pretty lively sound, it blocked a good bit of the offensive volume - enough to keep one in my trap case just in case I may need it on a gig.
I know Allen has done some A/B sound level comparison tests in a studio and I’ll update this review with those numbers . There is an AB frequency test screen below that pretty much says it all. Allen is a pro drummer in Nashville and a lot of drummers in “Music City” are using the skirt. They say it works! The price for the basic black model with red embroidered logo is $68. You can order at the website www.snareskirt.com .
