Now we're back in the early 1930's again with this pair of Zilco marching/concert band heavies. These tie in directly with the earlier question concerning cymbals where hammering is not visible, or at apparent than usual:
[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/elvincymbals/Zilco.jpg[/img]
[color=purple3][font=Times New Roman][size=+1]There couldn't be a greater study in contrasts as far as hammering styles are concerned that what you see in this example. The cymbal on the right was hammered by an artisan with a heavy-handed style, but the cymbal on the left was quiet the opposite. Not only are there differences in the force applied in each case, but these cymbals were hammered with different types of hammer as well. Each artisan had his own and each was hand re-ground daily. The one on the right has a broad impact hammer. But on the left as you can see is narrow impact. In fact you almost have to strain your eyes to see any hammering at all on the left one, but its there. And yet both of these cymbals are concert heavies. So what are we to conclude from this disparity?
Simply this:
The artisan who hammered cymbal on the right had a considerably higher testosterone level than the one who hammered the cymbal on the left, that's all.
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[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/elvincymbals/1930sper20hammering.jpg[/img]
[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/elvincymbals/concert%2014%20pr.jpg[/img]
[color=purple3][font=Times New Roman][size=+1]A pair of 14" concert band early 1930's A's[/size][/font][/color]
[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/elvincymbals/14%20A%20concert%20hammering%202.jpg[/img]
[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/elvincymbals/A%2014%20concet%20hammering.jpg[/img]
[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/elvincymbals/Zilco%2012.jpg[/img]
[color=purple3][font=Times New Roman][size=+1]Here's another of the "primitive" types. As far as hammering is concerned examples such as this make the distinction between the earliest types of Avedis cymbals and their old world counterparts almost indistinguishable from one other. But I think the way that the earliest A's like this one were hammered had to evolve from the primitive style that you see here into the classic Avedis style which would been seen some time later. I say this because Aram himself, who was actually the one who first taught Avedis III how to hammer cymbals, didn't use what we have come to recognize as the Avedis hammering method either. In fact if you study examples of cymbals that Aram made under his own name in Bucharest Rumania, it's quite obvious that he employed the classic old world Constantinople style of hammering in the manufacture of his cymbals as well. So initially at least, he must have taught this same method to Avedis III too; and yet perhaps through his own experimentation over time his method evolved separately into a style that became uniquely his own. This unique style also led directly to the distinctly different sound that Avedis' cymbals had vs. their old K. counterparts. In fact over time they had evolved into completely separate instruments altogether. The proprietary family trade secret of treating the alloy became the only common thread that they still held in common.
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