"Before being music, percussion is contact, speech, feeling ; it's also the, from its origin to each presence."
(J.-P. Vanderichet, cité in F.-R. Tranchefort : Musical instruments of the world, volume 1- Paris, Seuil, coll. Points, 1980, p.25)
Struck or touched, beated or brushed, percussion heads are propably the things which give all its meaning to the following sentence : alive within themselves because always different in texture and their, they keep the instrument alive by hand mallets of the musician.
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2 types of heads are widely used in percussion :
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Natural heads
These are traditional head, usually calf skins, used by percussionnists all over the world for millennia. Once abandoned in favor of plastic heads, which were less restrictives, they have returned and are increasingly favored by musicians.
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Plastic heads
Emerged in Britain in the 1960s, they at first met some skepticism from musician as if their artificial nature robbed life of their vibration. However, the constant improvement of their quality and the increasing lack of good animal skins have prompted the majority of musicians to adopt them.
In addition, the plastic skins are less sensitives to atmospheric changes, which gives them an obvious advantage.
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