How to properly configure your very own drums for your very own body

One of the easiest mistakes made by new drummers - and even established as a bad habit in older ones - is to get in your own way by not configuring your kit properly. But your Uncle Mo-BEEL is here to help with that.

Tl;dr: You don't fit your body to the drums, you fit the drums to your body. The right way is the best way for your very own body. Here's how you find out what way that is.

A couple of things before we begin:

This is not a recipe for a specific way to set up your drums. I'm not telling you that your kit should look like mine when you're done, or that all your instruments should be located where I like all my instruments located. This is simply a method, a technique, for you to determine the ideal setup for yourself as dictated by your body, with your kit, to help you play your music the best, not mine. This is the process I recommend, but that doesn't mean that you should get the same results as I do, other than increased comfort and facility and accuracy. The final orientation you end up with will vary as much as the drums and the drumming and the drummer can vary, which is to say, infinitely. What those results are is up to you - this is just the best way I've found to get those results, and this way works for every drummer playing any drums in any type of music. And although this method presumes a standard two up/one down five-piece kit (such as my reference to the "middle tom" further down), the basics apply no matter how many pieces you have.

To the "southpaws":

If you are left-handed and play in a traditional orientation with your left arm crossed over your right to play the hi-hat, I'm not telling you to set your drums back up in a mirror image because you're doing it wrong, LOL. Simply swap the words "left" and "right" for each other where applicable. Also, if you play open-handed, swap left and right for each other where applicable to what you are doing with your hands and arms.

To the e-kit players:

Although this method was written with acoustic drums in mind, it is absolutely applicable to electronic ones as well, particularly the first five steps. The basic idea is the same: get your body squared away, then get the drums squared away around you. Just be careful on an e-kit to not crowd things in too closely - since most of them do not have shells, that allows you to squeeze them in closer and lower than you can with acoustic drums, and this can often be a counterproductive bad idea. It's not a matter of where the gear will let you put it, necessarily; it's a matter of locating the gear where your natural stroke says it should be when you reach to play it.

And yes, since e-kits come mounted on racks these days, it does get a bit more fiddly to locate anything that doesn't sit by itself on the floor, so do the best you can - e-kits are a rare exception where "take everything apart and start from scratch" might be more hassle than help.

Oh, and one other note: try to locate the pedal for your hi-hat directly under the cymbal pad for it, or as close to directly underneath as you can get. Why? Because that's where it will be on a standard hi-hat stand on an acoustic kit, if you should sit in on one. The feeling of playing will be much more directly translatable to acoustic drums if you do that.

Before we start taking stuff apart: 

Start first with this tip that was originally much further down the list, that I realized should actually be a preparation for this setup method, not a step in the middle, to establish a reasonable footprint for your kit:

Sitting at the kit with a drumstick in each hand, hold your arms straight out in front of you, parallel to the floor. Sweep them around to fully extending to your sides, then sweep them back together again. That half-circle you just drew in the air, whose radius measures from the center post of your throne to the end of your drumstick, and arcs from shoulder to shoulder? This is the area where as much of your kit should be located as possible - not too far away, not too far to one side, not too many items all bunched together to one side or the other. The more components you locate within this region, the easier it will be to play. If you play a larger kit with more pieces, you might not make all of them fit, but you should fit as many components into this area as possible, while doing your best to not crowd or overload one side or the other.

Okay? Okay. Now let's begin for real.

1) Take your drumset completely apart, down to its component items. Take your rack toms off their mounts, and your cymbals off the stands, and put them to the side. Leave your hats on your hi-hat stand and your snare on your snare stand, and set them aside.

Yes, I'm serious. Most setup issues literally start at the floor. So we are starting at the floor. We are wiping your drive and resetting to default, so to speak. So yes, take the rig completely apart.

2) Begin with nothing but your kick drum, kick pedal, and throne. Set your throne height so that your legs, feet, and ankles are at comfortable angles. You'll probably want your knees/thighs somewhere around a 100° angle from the floor, give or take. Do not sit too low. You will not only reduce your responsiveness on the kick, you will create positioning issues for your toms. Don't put your butt lower than your knees. If your toms are all "googly-eyed," facing each other with a large gap between them because they'll crash into the kick drum otherwise, it's most likely because you sit too low. (There are exceptions, to be fair, but your seated height is always the prime suspect.) Put your throne wherever it is most comfortable behind the kick drum, distance-wise. Orient it so that your hip, thigh, knee, foot, and kick pedal are all in a plumb line going straight through the bass drum perpendicular to the rim/head.

Note: If you do not own a proper drum throne, stop right here and do not do anything else until you buy one, even a cheap one. Not only are you depriving yourself of the necessary adjustability to make yourself comfortable behind the kit, you may also be risking lifelong injury to your hips and back. Ask me how I know. Now, if you are broke as a joke and have to use what you have for now, believe me, I get it - when I said "ask me how I know," that's how I know, LOL. But if you have one of every other item a drummer ought to have in a drum kit other than a proper purpose-built drum throne, put that at the very top of your gear priority list, with a gold star and a giant check mark next to it. Don't spend a dime of your gear budget on so much as a single tension rod until you get an actual drum throne. And even if you do have an actual throne, but it's not the greatest? Consider upgrading to a top quality throne. You have no idea what a difference it will make in your playing if you are playing from a truly luxurious throne.

3) Add the hi-hat in the same fashion, with a similar plumb line running though your left thigh, etc. right through the pull rod. If you use a double pedal, place the slave pedal now. Some drummers put it to the inside of the hi-hat pedal, others put it outside, but either way, make sure it is directly up against the hi-hat pedal, as close as you can manage, and along that same plumb line. They should be close enough together to cover both with one foot. And remember: the length of your pedal linkage is adjustable as well. If it needs to be longer, lengthen it. If it needs to be shorter, shorten it.

Many hi-hat stands have also come with a rotating tripod for this purpose for years now, perhaps including the one you are trying to set up right now. If you use a double pedal and the legs can spin, spin them to wherever they need to be. If they don't, do the best you can, and note that either a two-legged hi-hat stand, or one with a rotating tripod, should probably go second on your future gear shopping list behind the throne if you don't have one. (Something else to keep in mind as you go: sharpen your skills at threading your tripod legs over and underneath and between each other.)

If you have an actual two-kick setup, one of these or something like it is necessary to get the hi-hat pedal next to the secondary kick pedal. They are only thirty bucks as of 2026, and others range up to about $80. Trust me, if you have two kick drums, spend the money. The plus side is that you will be able to place both as one item.

Note: once this step is complete, your kick pedal(s) and hi-hat pedal should form a perfect 'V' with your throne at the center point, with both pedals more or less equidistant from the throne, as pictured here.

4) Add the snare drum between your legs. Adjust it for height and angle, so that it is at the most comfortable playing angle for you. Adjust the height and angle of your hi-hats without moving the stand until they are in the right place relative to the snare. Many drummers will tell you to line up the top rim of your snare with your belt buckle. Start about there and see where you end up.

5) Add your ride cymbal, adjusting its location, height, and angle to whatever feels best for you. You may find that the best place for it is slightly over the top of the right side of your bass drum, where a rack tom usually lives. This is fine.

At this point, you have placed the very most basic components of any drum kit where they make the most sense for you. Any pieces added beyond this step that may disturb the arrangement of the previous components are to be relocated, or discarded entirely. (Looking at you, middle tom.)

6) Mount your rack toms in the same fashion, putting them wherever they make the most sense for you. Not too flat, not too angled, not where they look cool, but wherever the bottom of your natural stroke says they go. Shoutout to r/drums regular TwoCables_from_OCN for sharing a brilliant observation about this: point the near side of the batter-side tom rims at your elbows. If you sit down at the drums with your arms hanging by your sides, the near side of the rack tom rims should be at about elbow level, with the other side a bit higher. The heads should be facing you and not each other, and they should be basically parallel, but with a slight arc to them. This will put them more or less at the easiest angle for clean playing. As with all other setup tips, start there and see where you end up.

Note: the most sensible thing to do may be to mount one or both of your rack toms on a cymbal stand to the left of the kick (offset toms) using one or more multiclamps. If you have 7/8" Pearl-type tom arms that both mount to the bass drum bracket, one of these might solve all your problems by its lonesome self. Or, if you have L-rod tom mounts, perhaps something like this, taking care to buy one with the correct diameter rods, of course; the three common sizes are 10.5mm (most brands) 12.7mm (DW and Ludwig Atlas), and for older drums, 9.5mm. Or, if both toms mount to a "platform" holder, L-rod type or otherwise, with a single post bass drum mount, guess what? Your double tom holder might even fit straight into one of your cymbal stand tripods, and bingo - double tom stand. You didn't even know you owned a double tom stand, did you? By the way, never forget: Drum hardware is like chrome Legos. Since it only comes in a handful of standard diameters, sometimes different pieces can snap together in lots of interesting, useful, and unexpected ways, even across brands.

Note #2: When it comes to this segment of the copypasta, I have an extremely IMO hot take about why we even have this problem to begin with, because it's a "new" problem we never had before the late 60s, that we now have because drum makers were cheap, ignorant, or both. Again, IMO.

Note #3: Often, drummers whose toms are hung from a clamp on a cymbal or tom stand, rather than mounted to the kick, will struggle with them tipping over, because the center of gravity is off. When mounting drums to stands, be aware of how the tripod legs can function as a "kickstand" to prevent this. If you have one drum clamped to a stand, orient the tripod so that one leg is directly under the drum, to push back against its tendency to want to hit the floor. If you are mounting two drums to a cymbal stand or double tom stand, put one leg between them. This will keep them standing tall.

Set up your floor tom for height, angle, and location in the same fashion, wherever it feels best, which probably will mean it sits right up against your kick at roughly the same height as the snare.

Note: You may have a "hanging" floor tom clamped to a stand, often the one that holds your ride, which can confound the previous "note" about not letting other components interfere with your ride placement. If that's the case, do the best you can. Hopefully it's on a boom stand and not a straight stand; if you have one, always use a boom stand top for your ride in this instance. You can place the floor tom where it feels best, then adjust the ride placement independently with the boom.

Note #2: If you have a "two down" kit with two floor toms, place the smaller one as described, and take care to not place the larger one too close in. I often see drummers here with their larger floor tom basically directly behind the smaller one, putting it almost behind the throne rather than out and away from it. Remember the "arc" we drew in the air at the top? Make sure your larger floor tom follows this "arc," so you don't have to contract your upper body or bend your elbows in tight to reach it. No matter how many toms you have, once they are all set up, they should basically be in a curve from left to right. I often see that curve break down at the very last drum - pay attention to that.

7) Add other cymbal(s), again without disturbing anything else. And take great care to set these up properly as well - if you've never seen this helpful video from Zildjian about where cymbal cracks come from (and how 99% of them are your fault), now would be an excellent time to do that.

8) Set every memory lock on the kit to these positions, so you don't have to do this all over again every time you take your kit apart for gigs, etc. If you don't have any, add some. If you're broke, and $5-$10 each for a dozen or so is a stretch, outfit your entire kit with the ghetto version for the cost of one chrome one from Gibraltar. Hell, I've been using one to mark the tripod height on my snare stand for 15 years now.

Final note: You'll know you've done it right if all the heads and the tops of the cymbals are facing you and not each other; most of your drums and cymbals are out in front of you, and not too far around to one side or the other; there are no great distances or weird spaces between items; all components of your kit are all equally reachable from where you sit, with the least amount of twisting and turning possible, without a bunch of items being crowded on one side or the other; and each instrument in your kit is located exactly where it needs to be for your body to correctly play it with the most ergonomic possible stroke, as though it were the only instrument you were playing, to the greatest degree possible.

Voila. A perfectly ergonomically assembled drum kit, for you and you alone.

A final note to gigging drummers, or those who plan to be someday: Once you develop your best, most ergonomic configuration, you should also practice taking it apart, putting everything in its cases if you have them, and pulling it back out and putting it back together again. One of the most underrated skills a working drummer can have is the ability to set up and tear down as quickly and efficiently and consistently as possible. Think of a soldier in boot camp, field stripping his rifle and reassembling it over and over again. You should be able to do the same with your kit, blindfolded, while being shot at, LOL. It will pay dividends when you are at the venue, I guarantee it.

PS: Expect to make adjustments over time. (If you're familiar with my setup copypasta over the years, you will notice that I've even done the same with the post itself, LOL.) Always let your body tell your drums how they should be set up. If your body tells you different, move stuff. And if you play with two or more rack toms, this may even mean "disturbing the arrangement" of the relationship between the kick and hats. A little wider apart won't kill you, and no one is sending the drum police to your house for breaking some law. There are exceptions to every rule, and these aren't even rules, but guidelines. Just let them guide you.