About

30 years making custom furniture, 15 building drums, I started this company when my old Fibes kit fell apart from misuse and adolescent apathy.  Underwhelmed by what was commercially available I turned to my woodshop and began building my own set of drums.  I wouldn’t jack my car up with that first kit but the seed was planted and slowly this company started to grow.

Beginning with snare drums only I pulled every stick of lumber off my woodshop racks and started cutting.  Why staves? 1. The world had enough plywood drums. 2. Steam bending had done all it could do.  3. Stave building made sense to my woodworking vocabulary.  A perfect circle assembled at rest, not under bent tension or slathered in glue, stave construction allowed wood to be wood and opened up all the nuance of tone and color between the various species.

Trial and error for the first few years, gigging and tweaking, finally finishing something worthy of showing.  I contacted my 10 favorite working record producers with a letter.  ‘My name is Jefferson and this is a drum I built.  Take it for a spin and tell me what you think.  If you hate it there’s a return label included.  If you love it send me $1000.’  Not one of the 10 was returned and this little drum company, Sugar Percussion, was off and running.  15 years later and still loving every day in the workshop.  

Every species of wood, Acrylic, Aluminum, Painted and Clear Finished, whatever you want we’ll build it.  From our several classics to full custom.  Snares, full kits, anything you like.

This company was started as a woodworking business.  It quickly became a family of neurotics, a gathering of like-minded enthusiasts wanting more from their instruments, wanting the person who builds them to care as much as the person who plays them.  We care very much.  My therapist might say too much.

1 Family, 2 craftsmen, 1643 drums… and counting.