Canopus ??? Anyone

lawacker

Member
Looking to buy a small jazz kit. High end kit. Love the looks and spec's on these drums. I heard the sound file's and like them a lot. Anyone own a set? Are they worth the money that they are selling these kit's for ?? Bentley's drum shop in Calif. is where I saw them.I live in Michigan and no one on the East side has them,Thank you for any Info.
 
Good luck! I think they are awesome looking and sounding, but man they are expensive as hell!
 
canopus drums are nice - but i'm not a fan of their hardware. I just got a Yamaha Maple Custom (10/12/14/18). I got the 4 drums for a cheaper price than a canopus 3 piece kit. I would look at yamaha maple customs or maple custom absolute. You should also look Steve Maxwell custom sets (maxwelldrums.com). They are made by a guy from craviotto but they are much cheaper. There are stores in NY and Chicago- they could probably ship them out to Michigan if you wanted them (they have sound files on the website).
 
Looking to buy a small jazz kit. High end kit. Love the looks and spec's on these drums. I heard the sound file's and like them a lot. Anyone own a set? Are they worth the money that they are selling these kit's for ?? Bentley's drum shop in Calif. is where I saw them.I live in Michigan and no one on the East side has them,Thank you for any Info.


Allied Music in Toledo Ohio had them in Stock when I was in Ohio. I thought they were pretty good
 
Allied Music (formerly Peeler Drum) in Ohio is a great source, as is Steve Maxwell's drum shops in either Chicago or NYC. Both dealers carry Canopus, and these drums are custom built by a team of about half a dozen drum builders in Japan who tend to focus primarily on jazz drums. Supposed to be excellent quality.

Steve has two sets lightly used for under $2K (18, 14, 12 and possibly a snare, not sure)--I know because I thought about getting a kit. As someone else noted in this thread, Canopus's tom hardware, etc., more or less sucks--it is average run-of-the-mill Gibraltar/GMS kind of stuff. If you are not looking into ultra high-end jazz (e.g., Craviotto kits), then Yamaha Maple Customs and Maple Customs Absolutes are probably the next best industry standard drum kit. And Yamaha's tom hardware is excellent.

Note: As we all probably know, you can make any kit, I suppose, sound jazzy with head choices and tuning. Steamer, a frequent poster on this forum, plays a Peace bubinga jazz kit (18, 14, 10) and loves it. Similarly, I have seen a lot of professional jazz drummers over recent years use just about anything--from Mapex Pro Ms (low-end kit) and Saturns (mid-to-high level kit) to Yamaha birch, Tama SC Bubingas (both upper end) to Gretsch Catalinas (low end but sound quite good). Heck, I personally think even Yamaha Oak Customs sound fantastic with single ply coated Ambassadors (i.e., jazz heads) on them.

After all of my dilly-dallying with comparing drums for jazz (and I've done a lot of this indecisive, second-guessing on this forum to solicit advice), I've just started to realize one should go with the sound you like best. If the Canopus drums really appeal to your ears, then go for them--and Allied or Steve Maxwell can easily hook you up in the midwest/east coast region. It is nice to please an audience's ears, but a drummer's ears have to like the sound too!
 
How about a Unix or Kumu if you've got the dough to spend (although I'm not sure the Unix is that pricey)?
 
I have a Canopus Zelkova snare drum. Never played a Canopus kit. The snare drum is a unique instrument, carved from a tree, zero glue. PM me if you want any more details
 
No intent to threadjack, and I like the Canopus, but listen to the Sakae snare on the Memphis site. No info on a full kit but the bubinga snare at $700 is simply awesome for jazz.
 
Note: As we all probably know, you can make any kit, I suppose, sound jazzy with head choices and tuning. Steamer, a frequent poster on this forum, plays a Peace bubinga jazz kit (18, 14, 10) and loves it. Similarly, I have seen a lot of professional jazz drummers over recent years use just about anything--from Mapex Pro Ms (low-end kit) and Saturns (mid-to-high level kit) to Yamaha birch, Tama SC Bubingas (both upper end) to Gretsch Catalinas (low end but sound quite good). Heck, I personally think even Yamaha Oak Customs sound fantastic with single ply coated Ambassadors (i.e., jazz heads) on them.

After all of my dilly-dallying with comparing drums for jazz (and I've done a lot of this indecisive, second-guessing on this forum to solicit advice), I've just started to realize one should go with the sound you like best. If the Canopus drums really appeal to your ears, then go for them--and Allied or Steve Maxwell can easily hook you up in the midwest/east coast region. It is nice to please an audience's ears, but a drummer's ears have to like the sound too!

Good observations Robert...honestly with the quality of drums in general {especially smaller kits for acoustic jazz work} being produced these days I don't see the need to spend the obscene amounts i've seen thrown around on some of these ultra high end custom jazz size kits. Just me....... but if you can really hear the difference and it makes you happy that's cool for sure. Some people just have to have what they percieve {and percieved in the eyes of their fellow peers} as the "best" and the deep pockets to pull it off.

Yes the 9 ply AA flame bubinga Bop kit sound amazing Robert for acoustic jazz work as does the 2nd Bop kit I added made of 9 ply Canadian rock maple shells. Took those into the studio 2 weeks back and my lord what a truly great drum sound especially with the matching maple shell snare for the kit this Peace endorser recently recieved. With the quality of drums like this without knowing what they are and taking bias against Tiawanese drums and such still floating around right out of the mix you'd be hard pressed IMHO to say who made them not knowing after hearing some of these final mastered tracks when in direct comparison to drums worth several thousands more... tuning and head selection and factors on the actual player end a given in the mix.

Select and open your pocket book wisely after doing some research is my sage advice folks... could save you ALOT of cash but still get the quality of sound and quality of drums in general you're after if brand status alone or having the right brand {in the eyes of others} isn't your main objective.

The 2 kits in question. Older picture of maple shell kit with phosphor bronze snare for reference.........
 

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