Tenor drum

A tenor drum is a membranophone without a snare. There are several types of tenor drums.

Early music

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Early music tenor drum or long drum is a cylindrical membranophone without snare used in Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque music. It consists in a cylinder of wood, covered with skin heads on both ends, that are tensioned by ropes. Played with two sticks, this type of drum varies in pitch, according to its size.

Orchestral music

In a symphony orchestra's percussion section, a tenor drum is a low-pitched drum, similar in size to a field snare, but without snares and played with soft mallets or hard sticks. Under various names, the drum has been used by composers since the mid-19th century. It is particularly noticeable in scores by 20th-century English composers such as Benjamin Britten and William Walton, and American composers such as Aaron Copland and Samuel Barber.

Multi tenor drums (United States)

Tenor drums are used as a marching percussion instrument, commonly as mounted sets of 4-6 drums allowing one person to carry and play multiple drums simultaneously. Other names for these drums include the general "toms" and "timp toms", as well as names specific to configurations by number of drums: "duos" (2 drums), "tris", "trios", "trips", "triples" or "tri toms" (3 drums), "quads" or "quad toms" (4 drums), "quints" (5 drums), and "squints," "hexes," "six-packs," "tenors" or "sextets" (6 drums). The number-specific term "quads" is often used as a generic term even for configurations with more than four drums.