# Who First Used the Rimshot?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-first-used-the-rimshot/171031>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [April 25, 2003, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-first-used-the-rimshot/171031 "2003-04-25T03:24:31Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\
**Post date:** [April 25, 2003, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-first-used-the-rimshot/171031/1 "2003-04-25T03:24:31Z")

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You know what I mean: the sound of a couple of drum beats and (usually) a cymbal after a joke.

Who first decided that the audience needed an auditory cue that they’d been told a joke?

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**Author:** ![Blackeyes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f6c823/32.png) [@Blackeyes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blackeyes)\
**Post date:** [April 27, 2003, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-first-used-the-rimshot/171031/2 "2003-04-27T23:30:04Z")

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Um. Jimmy Carter? _Badum pssht_.

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**Author:** ![I\_can\_t\_believe\_that\_s\_butter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8edcca/32.png) [@I\_can\_t\_believe\_that\_s\_butter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_can_t_believe_that_s_butter)\
**Post date:** [April 28, 2003, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-first-used-the-rimshot/171031/3 "2003-04-28T01:19:47Z")

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I was ready to say “probably Gene Krupa”, but I see this is a different area.

And, a rimshot is actually…oh, never mind… 😃

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**Author:** ![Scruff](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Scruff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scruff)\
**Post date:** [April 28, 2003, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-first-used-the-rimshot/171031/4 "2003-04-28T02:15:18Z")

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It probably comes from vaudeville or the comedy circuit in the Catskills. I know that there was a joke back when my Dad was a lad (somewhere around 1940) which went:

“Two elephants fell off a cliff. Bom bom” (The last being an attempt to mimic the sound of the drum for a version of a rimshot).