Royal Swedish Navy Cadet Band - The First Drummer or Drum Major

The First Drummer or Drum Major

The First Drummer, Drum Major, or flaggtrumslagare is the leader of the band during marching. The first drummer also has responsibility for the marching quality of the band, as well as responsibility for composing figurative shows for performances. The first drummer does not carry a drum; the title is better understood as the leader of the drummers (and as such of the band). The sign of command of the first drummer is the ceremonial mace or stav, although by tradition, an ornate drum strap is carried across the shoulder as well.

The Sergeant Major of the Drums or drum major is the leader of a marching band, drum or bugle corps, or pipe band. The Drum Major is usually positioned at the head of the Band or Corps and is the figure who stands out in the public eye. The Drum Major is responsible for providing commands either verbally, through hand gestures, or with a mace in the military or with whistle commands or a baton in the US civilian bands to the ensemble regarding where to march, what to play, and what time to keep. They are often dressed in more ornate clothing than the rest of the Band or Corps.

The Drum Major of the RSwNCB is by tradition also a musician in the band hence plays his/her instrument at indoor concerts.

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