Drumming Robot: From Drum Machines to ABB Robots

A drumming robot has a harder job than it looks. It must hit a drum head at the right instant, with the right force, hundreds of times a night, and keep going when the tempo shifts. This post follows that job from the foot pedal and the first drum machines to robot bands and the humanoid hand Boston Dynamics showed in October 2026. It also looks at where ABB's robots could fit. ABB has not announced a drummer, so the ABB sections describe what its arms already do and what that could mean for music.

A modern drum kit being played: the instrument a drumming robot has to match. Photo: Mostafameraji / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)

From foot pedals to the first drum machines

The drum kit grew out of necessity. In the late 1800s a "trap set" was one drummer juggling several drums, often with sticks on both the bass drum and the snare. Foot pedals were tried for decades, and in 1909 Ludwig & Ludwig patented the first commercially successful bass drum pedal. One player could now keep a beat with a foot and use both hands elsewhere. That is the first time a machine, a simple linkage, took over part of the drummer's work.

William F. Ludwig's bass drum pedal patent, granted May 25, 1909. Photo: William F. Ludwig / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Machines that played rhythms without a person came next. The Rhythmicon, developed between 1930 and 1932 and shown publicly in 1932, was an early attempt. The Chamberlin Rhythmate arrived in 1957 and played tape loops of real drum kits. In 1959 the Wurlitzer Sideman used a rotating disc, much like a music box, to trigger sounds. Seeburg and Gulbransen released the Select-A-Rhythm in 1964, reported as the first fully transistorized drum machine. None of these hit anything. They produced the sound of a drum, so the sound came from a speaker.

The inside of a Wurlitzer Sideman, a 1959 drum machine that used a rotating disc, at the Cantos Foundation museum. Photo: guiltysin / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

Programmable machines followed. Roland released the CR-78 in 1978, a programmable unit, and the TR-808 in 1980. The Linn LM-1, also from 1980, is described as the first commercially released drum machine to use digital samples. Recorded music soon leaned on them. Yet a drum machine only plays a recording. It has no sticks, no rebound, and no one to watch. A physical drumming robot tries to fill that gap, and it also has to deal with real stick bounce, and a kit that someone may bump or move between shows.

A Roland CompuRhythm CR-5000 drum machine from 1981. Photo: Pittigrilli / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)

Robot bands and a new humanoid hand

The Berlin band Compressorhead put the physical version on stage. Its first four robots were built between 2007 and 2012, made from recycled parts, and the band played its first live show at the 2013 Big Day Out festival in Australia. Its drummer, Stickboy, has four arms that hold sticks and two legs that work the kick drum. It was built in 2007. The photo shows the band's drum riser at a 2013 trade fair, where the kit and sticks are the same ones a human would use.

The Compressorhead drum riser at Musikmesse Frankfurt, 2013, with the robot drummer Stickboy among the cymbals. Photo: Torsten Maue / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The latest news is about the hand rather than the drummer. On October 1, 2026, Boston Dynamics released video of a new four-finger hand for its Atlas humanoid. The hand has 13 degrees of freedom, up from 7, with four in the thumb and three in each other finger. Among its demos, Atlas rotated a drumstick inside its grip, alongside mounting a drill bit and tightening a small nut. Pressure sensors sit in the fingertips and palm. Spinning a stick shows finger control. It is not a drum solo, and Boston Dynamics did not present it as one.

A Boston Dynamics Atlas humanoid on display at Hyundai Motorstudio Goyang, 2026. Photo: Damian B Oh / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

ABB's closest link to music is the dual-arm YuMi, which conducted the Lucca Philharmonic with Andrea Bocelli in Pisa in 2017. That was a conductor's baton, not a drumstick, but it shows the arm can keep tempo in front of an audience. For drumming, the useful ABB tools are the compact IRB 1200, which is a compact arm for small parts and machine tending, and the GoFa CRB 15000 cobot, which is built to work next to people. Motion for any such act would normally be built and checked first in RobotStudio.

ABB's YuMi conducts the Lucca Philharmonic with Andrea Bocelli in Pisa, 2017. Photo: ABB

What a drumming robot has to solve next

Research is aiming at the part that the machines on stage skip. In 2025, researchers at SUPSI, IDSIA and Politecnico di Milano trained a simulated Unitree G1 humanoid to play full tracks in jazz, rock and metal with more than 90 percent rhythmic precision. All of it ran in simulation, and the robot played fixed patterns. Improvising and answering other musicians are still goals. Robot bands also turn up at maker events, such as the One Love Machine Band stage at Maker Faire Czech Republic in 2025.

A robot band on stage at the One Love Machine Band show, Maker Faire Czech Republic, 2025. Photo: Mojmir Churavy / Wikimedia Commons (CC0)

A home drummer raises problems that a stage act can avoid. A robot swinging sticks near children or a pet needs force limits, and a drum kit is loud in a flat. Price matters too, since few households will pay for a machine that does one thing. ABB's cobot approach, with arms designed to stop or slow on contact, answers the safety question for light payloads. It does nothing for noise or cost, and ABB does not present any of its arms as a home drummer.

The new generation ABB IRB 1200 with its OmniCore controller and FlexPendant, launched in 2025. Photo: ABB

In factories the lessons look different. Fast, repeatable strikes resemble tapping, pressing and testing jobs that already use small ABB arms, and a robot that can hold a stick lightly could also hold a probe or a tool. That is a possibility, not an ABB product. A drumming cell would also need a way to hear the beat and adjust, which means sensors and software that ABB would have to add or a partner would supply. If you want related background, see how robots became performers in ABB's YuMi and the rise of robot performers or how musical instrument makers use ABB robots today.

An ABB GoFa CRB 15000 cobot at a work table. Photo: ABB

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