In my years as a drum teacher I have taught, and continue teaching, many lessons away from my personal studio: in schools, student’s homes or studios. In the UK and overseas. In my experience, there are some fundamental items that I constantly see missing.

These items will make your practise time (or your child’s) much more efficient and enjoyable. Let’s assume you have a drum kit. Brand new, second hand, or hand-me-down from your uncle in Cornwall. What else do you need?

1. Pair of sticks
   
   Sounds obvious but in my experience it is not. Even if you don’t have drums you should have at least a pair of sticks. They are not necessary for lessons, as I have plenty of spare sticks, they will always be available. Having an actual drumstick in your hand makes a massive difference to your development!
   
   This is also an excuse to talk about what sticks to buy:
   Purchase regular sized sticks. Standard size is 5A. If you like them a bit thinner, go for 7A. If thicker: 5B. Avoid ‘kids-sized’ sticks, they have the same balance as a spoon (Hint: not ideal!) and children can use normal 5A without issues.
   
   Hopefully, your drumming career will be long and fruitful, giving you the chance of trying out different sizes & brands, and will eventually settle on the perfect pair for you. In the meantime, I will have several sizes available and will explain their differences and how to select the right tool for each job, but I recommend keeping it simple & standard to start with.
   
   
2. Rug.
   
   This is the most common missing item! The pedals & stands usually have rubber feet or spikes that will damage your flooring. They are designed to either hook to soft material, like a carpet, or dig into wooden planks (both common stage flooring!). They will destroy both, and the drums will not stay in place.
   
   Even if you have a carpet I would heavily recommend adding a tough rug with a rubber bottom. It needs to be somewhat rigid and be large enough to fit at least the throne, the Hi-hat and the Kick drum inside its footprint. If it fits the drums but not the throne the whole rug will slide away! Also, the tubing of the drum throne will erode with time which results in metal dust building up underneath, if you don’t protect your carpet it will slowly start tainting your carpet.
   
   
3. Music stand
   
   There are two main choices. Big and sturdy but not portable and small and flimsy but portable.
   If you have the space I would recommend the sturdy version. This way you can hold several books, sheets, devices, pens and all sort of shenanigans without fear of them falling.
   
   Beyond this, there are all sort of stands and clamps you can use for your music stand (I use a goose neck stand for my Ipad during performances, I have colleagues that have clamps that attach to the Hi-Hat). The possibilities are endless, but again, keep it simple for now.
   
   
4. Headphones/Speaker
   
   If you are using them for an electric drum kit: avoid HiFi bluetooth speakers/headphones. For some reason I don’t know they process the sound in a way that adds at least 200m/s of delay (latency) between striking the drum and the production of the sound, an eternity when playing drums! This is true even when using a cable. If you can, go for Keyboard amps as they have a better frequency response than guitar amps.
   
   If using headphones with an acoustic drum set, please, use ones with a high degree of noise isolation. Protect your hearing! Unfortunately, they fit very tightly around your head and may take some getting-used-to.
   
   
5. Cables (Minijack + jack adaptor)
   
   For connecting your phone, computer or miscellaneous music player device to the speaker or drum module to play along to songs. You may need other adaptors if your devices don’t have standard jack/mini-jack ports. The most common are mini jack to usb-c and minijack to lighting
   

These require different levels of investment but they will make an immense difference to the quality of your practise time.

Links are not affiliated at this time (I won’t receive anything if you purchase!) and I have no relation with the companies beyond using their products frequently. I added them for convenience.

I hope you have found this post useful. Please, get in touch if you think I missed anything or have any questions!

May the groove be with you.