Vic Firth

An accomplished inventor. An pioneering manufacturer. A brilliant musician. A respected educator. Most people would be more than happy being just one of these things. But Vic Firth was all four.

Born on June 2, 1930, in Winchester, Massachusetts and raised in Maine, his musical education began at an early age with the cornet, eventually moving to percussion, trombone, clarinet and piano. By the time he reached high school, Firth was writing his own arrangements and had formed an 18-piece orchestra, The Vic Firth Big Band, which performed across New England. He furthered his education in vibraphone, drums and timpani at New England Conservatory in Boston.

TEACHING, BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, VIC FIRTH, INC.

While a student at there, Firth began what was to become a lifelong passion: teaching. His guided particularly gifted students such as drummers Kenny Aronoff and Anton Figg, both enormously successful session player from the 1980s through today. At age 21, he became the youngest member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, a gig that required him to make special arrangements to complete his course work at the Conservatory. He spent more than 40 years performing with the BSO, playing for an incredibly distinguished roster of conductors such as Leonard Bernstein and Seiji Ozawa.

As the story goes, Firth was charged with performing pieces at the BSO which required a better drumstick than what was being manufactured at the time and the mother of invention made her appearance. Understanding exactly what type stick he needed, he whittled bulky sticks in to smaller ones, created some prototypes, sent them along to a wood turner and they eventually became the genesis of Vic Firth, Inc.

Initially intended for his own use only, the sticks became a highly in-demand item among his students, which led to them being carried by thousands of retailers across the world. To this day, Firth is credited with inventing and/or standardizing many of the manufacturing processes that are commonplace in the drumstick industry. The list of world-class drummers and percussionists working with his sticks and mallets is virtually endless. “We are selling the drummers’ bread and butter,” Firth was once quoted as saying. “They may think twice before buying a new set of drums, but they always need sticks.”

GRATEFUL DEAD APPEARANCE, DEATH, LEGACY

In a 2002 Boston Globe profile, Firth was described as “debonair, affable, intelligent and sometimes cheerfully profane.” In the same profile, Firth spoke about what he referred to as “a cameo appearance with the Grateful Dead” in Providence Rhode Island. “I was sitting on the stage, and they asked me to lead off the big drum solo,” he said. “I was wearing a coat and tie and I told them I’d look like a stuffed shirt. But they persuaded me to take them off, and I did start off the solo.”

And that’s when the trouble started. Through an audience member, word of Firth’s escapade reached a member of the BSO’s board of directors, and before long there were repercussions for the percussionist. Firth’s manager called him into his office and Firth recalled their conversation this way: “He said, ‘Tell me it isn’t true that you played with The Grateful Dead’ so I told him it wasn’t true, As I headed for the door, he said, ‘Did you really do it?’ and I said, ‘Of course I did.’ Then he said, “Well, just don’t do it again,’ and I didn’t.”

Vic Firth passed away on July 26, 2015, at age 85. His legacy lives on – and will forever – as drummers all over the world continue to perform with his brand of drumsticks and drum-related gear. Simply put, when it comes to drummers, no name is better known than that of native New Englander Vic Firth.

(by Lew DiTommaso)