Ten years ago, Benny Grab collaborated with SONOR on what became one of the most popular signature snare drums on the market. Now, the German drum maker has teamed up with Greb again for a re-imagined version of the original, plus a surprising addition: the all-new SONOR Benny Greb Signature Brass snare drum. This drum starts with a 1.2 mm solid brass shell in Benny’s preferred 13 x 5.75” dimensions, which he has long favored for its wide tuning range. Then, SONOR added all the same new features they added to the upgraded beech snare. The offset vintage teardrop lugs are sleek and stylish. The modern Dual Glide snare strainer system allows drummer to change the snare-side head without messing up their wire tension settings. The finish on this drum rounds out a vintage feel—in the case of the brass model, it’s a vintage patina with a bright gold stripe down the center.
But the greatest innovation in this new signature snare is a feature Greb designed himself. He calls it the Monorail dampening system, and it gives this drum an unparalleled range of sound possibilities, right out of the box. The monorail system features two internal mufflers, inspired by old-school internal mufflers made famous by jazz drummers of the past. But while those mufflers required the drummer to remove the batter head to adjust them, the Monorail system lets the drummer adjust the mufflers independently with two dials on the outside of the shell. One of the mufflers comes fitted with a soft “sheepskin” head and the other with a hard “felt” head. Drummers can easily adjust both of these mufflers in seconds, even between or during songs, creating the impression of multiple snare drums in one. Because the mufflers are both variable, with interchangeable pads and separate adjustment mechanisms, the possibilities are nearly endless. Metal snares can be notoriously tricky to tune without unwanted overtones, and this snare addresses that obstacle head-on, with a solution as simple as it is revolutionary.
