Can anyone tell me what the difference is in the sounds of, steel, copper, or brass snare drums / [ All things being equal like heads,
snares and size ].
Here is a very generalized statement from my experiance.
All things being equal in size thickness of shell and all. The steel will be a little drier and or brittle sounding (generally it is stiffer) the copper a little warmer sort of like a wood snare but with a little bit of a upper mid hollow sound (because they are a softer alloy of metal) and the brass has a bright sound with some upper frequency ring.(like a bell)
Again this is such a oversimplification it is laughable at best, but it will give you one man's idea anyway.
It is my mission to have one snare minimum of each type!
They all record differently. For general use I prefer the tone of a maple snare or a brass one myself.