Most people know that drums are a percussion instrument, but do they know why?. The percussion family is very wide and includes instruments that you might not think are included. Cymbals and timpani are often thought of as the main focus of percussion and drums in general. The drums in a band one could not do without and are thought of as being the beat or key element of the sound and rightly so. You can see then that percussion is not drums alone. As the range of percussion is so significant, many top players are drawn to this category of instruments and this aspect of music.