Vic Firth is an American drum stick, and drum/percussion mallet manufacturer founded in 1963, "by accident" according to its founder Vic Firth, a drummer/percussionist.^[1] The company headquarters is in Boston, Massachusetts and bills itself as the world's largest manufacturer of drum sticks and mallets.^[2]

[edit] History

The company began when Vic Firth, who had been performing with the Boston Symphony Orchestra for 12 years, was asked to perform pieces which he felt required a higher quality drumstick than those that were currently being manufactured. Firth decided to design a set of his own sticks.^[3]

Firth hand-whittled the first sticks himself from bulkier sticks and sent these prototypes to a wood turner in Montreal. The two prototypes that he sent would become the SD1 and SD2, the first two models of sticks ever manufactured by the Vic Firth Company. As Firth himself states: "It came out of necessity not of imagination or my ability to start a company." Although the sticks were initially intended for Firth's personal use, they gained popularity among his students and were eventually carried by retailers.

Today, the Vic Firth product line has grown from the SD1 and SD2 to approximately 300 products in its catalog, and the company manufactures 12 million sticks a year. ^[4]

The company's current range of products also includes a line of pepper mills, salt grinders, and rolling pins manufactured in Newport, Maine under the Vic Firth Gourmet brand. ^[5]

[edit] Signature artists

Vic Firth endorses many percussionists around the world. Artists that design sticks or mallets exclusively for Vic Firth are known as signature artists. Some of the most notable include the following.

Vinnie Paul Abbott Alex Acuna Dave Adams Jotan Afanador Morgan Agren Ted Atkatz Charlie Benante Terry Bozzio Gary Burton Ivan Busic Danny Carey Billy Cobham John Dolmayan Johnny Fay Chris Fehn Steve Gadd Tim Genis Alex Gonzalez Tomas Haake Ralph Hardimon Andy Hurley

Scott Johnson Steve Jordan Thomas Lang Jojo Mayer Nicko McBrain Jörg Michael Stanton Moore Jeff Queen Buddy Rich Neil Sanderson Christoph Schneider Racci Shay Robert Van Sice So Percussion Roger Taylor Chad Wackerman Dave Weckl Wuv Zoro

[edit] References