A drum is a musical instrument of percussion, consisting either of a hollow cylinder, over each end of which is stretched a piece of skin or vellum, to be beaten with a stick; or of a metallic hemisphere (as in a kettle-drum) with a single piece of skin to be so beaten. The drum is the common instrument for marking time in martial music; one of the pair of tympani in an orchestra, or cavalry band.
A kettledrum (timpani) is a drum made of thin copper in the form of a hemispherical kettle, with parchment stretched over the mouth of it. Kettle-drums, in pairs, were formerly used in martial music for cavalry, but are now chiefly confined to orchestras, where they are called timpani or tympani. Research Kettle-drum
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Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Kettle-drum
