Hey there,

Meinl percussion started a new contest, which is called FACES OF PERCUSSION that gives you the chance to appear in the 2009 MEINL BOOK OF PERCUSSION.

We are looking for people who love to play percussion - just send us a picture of yourself expressing your musical personality. The photo can be taken Anywhere. There's only one restriction: You should not be playing an instrument in the picture, because we believe that with your love for music, your musical personality will shine through and be self-evident.

The coolest pictures will win new Meinl percussion instruments.

Take part in FACES OF PERCUSSION and keep on drumming

Helge

I would bet that life in the Artist Relations department at Meinl is a lot like life in any other department and in any other company, in that you take the good with the bad.

That being said, I just had to take the bad.

Today I had to cancel an artist's contract with us. This doesn't happen very often. In fact, it's happened only a few times since I have been with Meinl...and that's been about five years now.

I think the reason why we have had to cancel so few artists is because we are very careful in selecting who we decide to partner up with. Whenever we sign an artist, we always feel fairly certain that -

A.) They are good people.

B.) They are good drummers.

C.) Their activities are in line with ours, in order to achieve the goals we have set for the company.

D.) They are playing our cymbals because they truly want to play our cymbals.

I feel that this last point is the most important one. It sets the standard for all of the interaction that follows between the artist and our company. Now I'm not naive. I know that I can't always be 100% certain that there won't be an artist here and there who is being opportunistic and who is working with us because he/she secretly shopped around and found that we would provide the best deal for him/her. But generally those artists are easy to identify, so we usually never have to deal with them.

In today's case, I cancelled an artist's contract because after a series of events I came to the final realization that this artist was not playing our cymbals because he/she truly wanted to play them, but for reasons less than that...and that is something that if I can prevent, I will.

Thanks for reading,

Chris

Greetings,

Meinl Cymbals is pleased to welcome drum set artist, percussionist and educator, Rigo Collazo to the team. Hailing from San Juan, Puerto Rico, Rigo has immersed himself in drum studies throughout his life, culminating with a tenure at the Musician's Institute in Hollywood, CA, where he studied with such notables as Joe Porcaro, Ralph Humphrey, Dave Beyer, and Casey Scheuerell among others.

After his stint at MI, Rigo found his way back to PR, where he has worked in television as well as with different artists. Most notably, Rigo has been with the popular pop/rock/world music group Millo Torres y el Tercer Planeta since 2003, appearing on album and in concert with the band.

Along with his performing activities, Rigo runs a top-notch professional drum school in San Juan, called RigoDrum.

Welcome Rigo!

Check out his artist page for more information on Rigo.

Saturday 3rd May and we were late half an hour… and every single minute we missed was a pitty!
I went, with my girlfriend Katharina, to see Wolfgang Haffner playing his last gig of the Acoustic Shapes tour 2008. When we finally arrived at the venue, the collector at the doors told me,  I am to late, the gates were closed! Damn, no chance! We went there to see the gig and after I was begging him for a couple minutes he decided to let us in. Dudes, if you get the chance to see Wolfgang Haffner, catch it. The gig was simply amazing. I do not have to tell you about Haffners drum skills, they are just undescribable! But what made the evening special was the whole spirit, the feeling of the music and, not at least, the humour Wolfgang spread over the audience. Just amazing!

Check out the pics!

Cheers, Thomas…

Greetings,

I'm pleased to announce that Moe Carlson of the Canadian band Protest the Hero, is now an official Meinl Cymbal artist.

Moe is one of the most exciting drummers to hit the scene in a long, long time. Moe and the band take equal parts prog-rock, hardcore, and metal, add their virtuosic chops and infectious melodies and come out with a sound all their own that's refreshing and exciting. Check out their new album, Fortress for a taste of what I'm talking about. In the sonic sense, these guys are cosmic voyagers.

When I was entering Moe's information into the database for his artist profile, I was blown away to find out the he's only been playing drums for 8 years!!!???!!! That's absolutely insane. When you listen to the dexterity, precision, technical skill and musicality that oozes from his playing, it will be hard for you to believe also.

Moe's getting ready to head to Japan and China, which I know he's stoked about, and then he and the band will be on the entire VANS Warped Tour in the US this summer.

Welcome Moe!!!

Greetings,

A funny thing happened to me last January when I ran out of the NAMM booth to chase down one of our Meinl Cymbal artists, who walked by the booth when he was supposed to have been doing an artist signing for us at any moment.

As I was walking at a good clip to catch up with said artist, I looked to my left and saw Tom Hunting walk by...

Tom is an original member of one of the heaviest, deadliest and nastiest thrash bands of all time - Exodus. For those of you who need an education, Exodus played a huge role in forming the original early 80's Bay Area Thrash Metal movement (heck...Kirk Hammett of Metallica was even a member of Exodus at one point), by storming onto the scene with a razor sharp sound and attack that pummeled audiences into dust.

At this point it's probably very obvious that I was a fan. Absolutely! Still am too. When I was a kid, I HAD to learn the drum part to The Last Act of Defiance. So it was very cool for me to get to meet one of the guys that had a big influence on me in my formative drumming years. What I found was a person who is very humble and who is very happy to still be doing what he loves for a living.

Tom and Exodus are now back and better than ever, with their latest album The Atrocity Exhibition, Part 1 making a massive impact on today's metal scene. Tom's drumming still has that on-the-edge-precision that made him relevant in the 80's and 90's, and makes him relevant now.

Welcome to the team, Tom!