after two days of hard work, our booth setup is now completed and we are ready to go. everything went ok and without any major problems. a good pre-planning is the key to a smooth setup. thanks to our great team, the amazing guys of wd+b (our booth construction company), and lampenfieber who are in charge for the sound installations at our booth, we got done fast and without any complications.
musikmesse doors open in about 10hrs from now and i am excited as if this was my first messe (it's my 19th actually). i hope to see some of you there during the next four days. TO A GREAT SHOW!
- norbert

it's that time of the year again when the whole drum industry is gearing up to attend the international musikmesse in frankfurt germany. next monday our team will drive to frankfurt for a two-day booth set-up, followed by four days of convention. this is going to be my 19th musikmesse, and i am still excited as if it was my first one. like in previous years, we will have our popular soundbooth again with three outstanding artists performing for you:

performing thursday, april 02: gergo borlai from hungary (an exciting new player)
performing friday, april 03: derek roddy from usa
performing saturday, april 04: jost nickel from germany

stop by our booth 3.0.b25 for a detailed performing schedule. all three players are worldclass and not to be missed. check out their videos above.

my colleages and i will also be at our booth most of the time. so stop by to say hello and have a chat with us. we're glad to answer any question you might have.

- norbert

the "alphabet of rhythm" is the essence of benny greb's new dvd. everything evolves around it. in order to symbolize it in the dvd, benny had it built from real solid wood by a carpenter. it measures 170 cm x 170 cm (about 5.5ft x 5.5 ft) and is a great piece of art. all of you who have watched the dvd already or who have seen some preview clips know what i am talking about.
to our big surprise, benny has offered to donate the wooden alphabet frame to us. yesterday one of our workers drove to hamburg (where the frame has been stored in benny's rehearsal place so far) to pick it up. today it has arrived and we have proudly unpacked and set it up here in our office building. it will have an place of honor in our office where every guest who visits us will see and appreciate it. funny enough, some of our guys here have been standing in front of it already clapping along to the alphabet.
thank you benny for donating it to us. it's a great honor having it here.
- norbert

finally they are now online; we have just uploaded eleven short videoclips. in everyone drummer felix lehrmann demonstrates one of our series by playing a couple of grooves using a different series everytime. you can view some of them here, or on our video page, or on felix's artist site, and last but not least on the respective product sites.
i personally love felix's grooves, that's why i chose him for this project :-) however you can now also clearly hear our different series being used in a real playing situation. i hope it will make your choice easier now.
enjoy watching felix' grooves :-)
- norbert

greetings from russia. i am here one more day to make preparations for the upcoming meinl drum festival which is going to take place at the moscow palace of youth on june 06. i have been checking out the venue yesterday and it is absolutely stunning. i am excited about everything.
while here i found out about the m.i.p.a. (musikmesse international press award) nominations. 112 music magazine from all over the world vote for the best products in certain categories of 2008/2009. it's an absolute pleasure to hear that our soundcaster fusion have been nominated for it in the "best cymbal" category.
the winner will be announced during the m.i.p.a. ceremony at the upcoming musikmesse. i hope we gonna be the ones to get the award, lets keep our fingers crossed.
- norbert

Meinl Cymbals welcomes Nick Slack to its family of cymbal artists. Nick plays with the Nashville rock and roll outfit The Pink Spiders. Extremely cool and extremely hip, Nick and TPS lay down solid hook-laden songs that stick in your brain like a gorilla glue cocktail.

The band is hitting the road for a few dates and then has plans to hit the studio for another slab of tuneage.

To check out Nick's artist page, click here.

Last night I went to the Muse here in Nashville, TN to see Derrick Nau of Skeletonwitch. Derrick is the newest member to the family of Meinl Cymbal artists. Derrick plays with a blistering and raw feel that's punishing and still musical. Plus, he's a super nice and cool dude, as are all of his band mates. These guys are really good musicians who lay down some seriously cool metal. Check out Derrick's artist page by clicking here.

Funny how it works in the AR world, but in the interest of doing about the single largest 180 degree turn I can think of, today I am heading to the Sommet Center here in Nashville to hang with Meinl Cymbal Artist Chris Coleman to see him hold down the fort in his current gig, NKOTB (New Kids on the Block). Click here to see Chris' artist page at meinlcymbals.com. Pix of Chris in action coming up soon!...

dominik schreiber, drumtech of in flames' danviel svensson visited us today to gear up with some cymbals for the band's upcoming east-europe tour. as usual, dominik's choice were a couple of new mb20 series crashes which are daniel's preferred sound. the tour is going start on march 25th in zagreb, croatia and will continue to austria, slovenia, serbia, bulgaria, romania, hungary, slovakia, czech republic, and poland. make sure to catch in flames at one of their shows!
- norbert

Thomas Lang is gearing up for some clinic action in April in Canada. All of the clinics are being hosted by Steve's Music.

The snow should be thawing around those parts by that time, so time to get out of the house and go enjoy some killer drumming! Here's the details - 

OTTAWA SHOW:
Tuesday, April 21st, 2009
BRONSON CENTRE
211 Bronson Avenue
Ottawa, ON
7:00 PM
Tickets Available at Steve's Drum Shop
Call: 613-789-1131

MONTREAL SHOW:
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
CORONA THEATRE
2490 Rue Notre Dame O
Montreal, QC
7:00 PM
Tickets available @ Steve's Drum Shop
Call: 514-878-2216

TORONTO SHOW
Thursday April 23, 2009
THE MOD CLUB
722 College St. West
Toronto, ON
7:00 PM
Tickets available at Steve's Drum Shop
Call: 416-593-8888

I was listening to some vintage Ozzy Osbourne today - Diary of a Madman to be exact. The best Ozzy era as far as I am concerned, with Randy Rhoads on guitar. That got me to thinking about one of our cymbal artists Brann Dailor, who loves Randy Rhoads so much that he had his drumkit wrapped in a black with white polka dot finish, just like Randy's old flying-v guitar. He also has a picture of Randy on the front bass drum head in full rock action! Awesome.

So that got me to thinking about all of the cool stuff happening with Brann and Mastodon these days...

Check out the new Mastodon video for Divinations, from their forthcoming album Crack the Skye (set to be released March 24). Interesting video with some great Meinl shots (thanks Brann!). I really think this album is going to be a winner. 

http://www.mtv.com/videos/mastodon/346252/divinations.jhtml  (I tried embedding it, but there were some issues...technology...sheesh...)

Also, check out Brann on the COVER of the April issue of DRUM! magazine as soon as it hits newsstands March 16. Yeah!

Finally, and this is totally random...just for giggles, check out the picture that the author found of himself at 16 years of age...back when he actually had hair...and a lot of it. What can I say? It was the early 90's!

it's funny how things turn out sometimes. when the ups driver came today and delivered two boxes, i thought of the following situation as if it just happened yesterday:
i was standing at a bar at the 2002 pasic show in columbus, ohio and had a drink with rob wallis of hudson music. we were reflecting on the day while hangin' out with our drink when he asked who in my opinion could be the next rising star in the drumming world? i thought for a second and then i said to rob that there is a guy in germany who i had just found out about. "he is not ready yet, but will be soon. his name is benny greb" is exactly what i said to rob wallis. about five years later hudson music and benny began talking about doing a dvd together.
what the ups guy brought today were two boxes of benny's new hudson dvd which is now out and which we will sell at our booth at the upcoming musikmesse in frankfurt. what rob and i brainstormed about seven years ago has now become reality. to this day every once in a while rob still asks me if i had heard about other new drummers out there :-)

Today, everybody at Roland Meinl Musikinstrumente GmbH & Co. KG think in deep respect, remembrance and gratefulness of Roland Meinl our adored company founder. Today, 4th March 2009, would have been his 80th birthday. Thank you for all you have done for us!!!