Drum sets have really come almost full circle since their inception. In terms of basic setup, drum sets are in many ways identical to their early vintage drum set cousins. There are simply quite a few more components you can add to your drum set, and the individual components themselves are of a much higher quality, e.g. the shells are composed of a higher quality, better constructed wood. Drum kits were originally called trap sets, and they were essentially created in the United States. Early sets were composed almost exclusively of a bass drum, snare drum, one or two tom toms, and a pair of cymbals. This is still the basic drum kit that most players start off with, and many playing styles like jazz and blues require nothing more than these core components.
Up until the Sixties and Seventies, drum sets stayed pretty much with this basic setup with perhaps the standard addition of a floor tom. When the rock and roll revolution of the Seventies hit, drum sets became increasingly extensive. Drum sets hit their extreme with drummers like Neal Peart who had a massive drum set that included a full range of harmonically tuned tom toms and a wide variety of other percussion instruments.
Unlike many other instruments, there isn't a very high demand for vintage drum kits. There certainly are those who collect the drum kits of famous players, but they usually don't intend on playing them. A used drum kit just generally doesn't hold up as well as say a used violin, or a vintage electric guitar, and you don't hear the talk about a particular "golden era" of drum sets. Today you can find high quality pre-configured drum kits from a variety of great manufacturers, and you can also simply create your own personalized drum kit from whatever components you choose. Despite the general high cost of drum kits, if you do some searching you are likely to find a good cheap kit that will serve as an excellent learner set.
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