Music Innovator Remo Belli Dies

Remo Belli, an innovator in the music industry who created and popularized the synthetic drumhead at his Los Angeles area company, died on April 25. He was 88. Belli founded his eponymous company Remo Inc. in the late 1950s in Hollywood and later moved to North Hollywood and then Valencia in 1996 where the company continues to develop and manufacture drumheads. In a 2011 interview with the Business Journal, Belli admitted to a fascination with how different cultures approached drumming, the pulse of music that gets people tapping their toes, snapping their fingers and getting up to dance. “You take away rhythm from different cultures and you have heavy problems,” Belli said in the interview. A native of Indiana, Belli became a professional musician while still in his teens and moved to Los Angeles after serving in the Navy. In 1957 he pioneered the synthetic drumhead using a Mylar cover as a replacement for the animal skin covers that had been used up until that time. In less than a decade, the Remo drumhead became the standard among professional and amateur drummers. At Remo Inc., Belli had been the head of product development and worked in a screened-off area from the rest of the manufacturing floor. He also got the company involved with the HealthRHYTHMS program to promote playing drums to relieve stress.