Everybody wants hi-hats

An interesting week. Much of it I have spent buried in video editing and fighting with software and youtube. It is quite galling to spend hours, nay days, making something look and sound beautiful, only to have youtube mangle it. After lots of testing of different video formats and codecs, I managed to get the final uploaded result to come out of youtube almost the same as when it went in. The result is here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ-6HEqGbfk - The InifniTri...

Meanwhile, I have received requests for hi-hats from all quarters. Bronze hi-hats, Stainless Steel hi-hats, micro-hats, giant hats and some too bizarre (and too secret) to mention. So, I think the week that remains before the UK National Drum Fair, will consist of mainly making hi-hats and ride cymbals. Hammer-tastic!

New Bronze

3 times my own weight in Bronze arrived the other week - quite a large order! It should keep me going for a while. Some of this is a high Tin content alloy. I have been having great fun working with it. It is quite a lot harder under the hammer but creates beautiful sounding cymbals.

The first of these will be for sale at the NDF in Birmingham the weekend after next.

Resolution

Right. I'm on a mission. Let's see how long it lasts...

Smaller blog entries. Much more frequently.

Did the London Drum Show at Olympia. Good show. Check. Next up - the UK National Drum Fair in Birmingham. 2 weeks to go. After that, one of the biggies - PASIC in Indianapolis. You have to wait until November for that one.

Last night, I had great fun with Andy Mac the photo / video genius. He shot some gorgeous looking HD footage of my new Symphonic Triangles. We had fun lighting the scene with a candelabra and a propane torch! Later on, I'm going to be breaking out the ribbon mics and the fancy pre-amps to do a soundtrack. I'm looking forward to editing together the most over-the-top promotional video for a small percussion instrument ever made...

Long time no blog...

The life of an independent cymbal maker is a busy one! Sourcing and buying metals, creating instruments, trying to promote and sell them, putting them carefully into shipping boxes, handing them over to shipping agents, playing music, doing the accounts, exhibiting at shows: Winter NAMM, Frankfurt Musikmesse, The UK Custom Drum Show, Chicago Drum Show. It’s nice to have a bit of a break now over the summer. Phew.

Time to catch up on orders. Time to develop new ideas. Time to investigate new materials. Time to make plans. Ohio Drum Show? Amsterdam Drum Show? Maybe. UK National Drum Fair? PASIC? Definitely.

The music festival and fringe has been on here in Bath. The Baghdaddies and Travis / Fripp were highlights of that for me. Ooh, and how could I forget – ANTA, Squeeze Me Macaroni and Team Brick. Last year it was Joanna McGregor playing John Cage. Spellbinding. In 3 weeks, I’ll be playing my gong rig at The Croft in Bristol with the wonderful Dan Bennett on guitar and processing.

Actually, I’ve sold some pretty sweet gongs lately. I need to make some more, if only for that performance. Back to the grindstone...

The Shows Must Go On

Well, the Hollywood Drum Show has been and gone, as has PASIC - the Percussive Arts Society International Convention, this year held in Indianapolis. I had an expo booth at both and had a great time.

The Hollywood Show was very much a drummers' event, plus a few sound-track type folks. Plenty of great artist clinics - but none that I got too see, being glued to my booth.

PASIC was fantastic. The world's largest percussion event with over 150 different performances / workshops / clinics over the 4 days and the expo running alongside for 3 days. A real wide range of folks coming to see the expo - drummers, percussionists of all sorts, young students, old masters and everything in-between. And, even the man who is in the guiness book of records for having the largest hand-shaped-things collection! A real pleasure to meet all the people who came to my booth. It was great to hang out with industry friends old and new in the evenings too. I hope I can afford to make the trip over and exhibit again next year.

While in Indianapolis, the home of the P.A.S., I visited their newly opened museum - the Rhythm Discovery Center. Some cool stuff in there - an enormous drum head from Remo, feel the low frequency vibes man! But, I must say, I was most fascinated by the Musser designed Glock and Vibraphone type instruments. Fantastic.

So, what's next? Well, I've got orders from before and after the shows to make and new things to create. That's going to keep me busy until January. And what's happening in January? NAMM of course! I'll be at NAMM, on the Pork Pie Drums Booth. Booth #3378. Their main drum kit will be furnished with my cymbals and a very special custom gong.

Hand crafted cymbals alongside hand crafted drums. Perfect!

From Hollywood to Hollywood

Hollywood, Birmingham, England to Hollywood, California, USA that is...

Getting a business up and off the ground, getting the world to hear about it is not an easy or simple affair. I seem to have spent much of this year either planning for or attending trade fairs and public shows. But it seems to be working.

Last weekend, I had a wonderful time at the UK National Drum Fair held in Birmingham. There was a great response from drummers to my range of cymbals and gongs and several of them were deafened by Carl Palmer's sudden ffff attack on my 1 metre, 7kg, hand-shaped gong (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwQzEN7OM3E )

Listening to young drummer of the year winner Richard Rayner at 14 and Eric Delaney at 85 on their respective kits was fantastic. But, so was just talking to the hundreds of "ordinary" drummers and other exhibitors at this annual event.

Here are some of the cymbals I had at the show:



And here are some of the gongs:




Some were sold, others have been reserved. But many of them, plus some new ones will be going over the pond with me to the Hollywood Custom and Vintage Drum Show in just under 2 weeks' time. It's going to be a blast. I'm really looking forward to it.

http://www.ukdrumfair.com/
http://www.hollywooddrumshow.com/

Synchronicity

About a month ago, I was exhibiting my Cymbals and Gongs at The Chicago Drum Show in the USA. The show is a "Vintage and Custom" event, with plenty of tasty exhibitors complemented by hordes ravenous visitors.

It was great to meet all the different people there but the stand-out by far for me was Will Calhoun; meeting him and watching him play the drums. Will is a Grammy Award winner and the drummer for, among others, Living Colour. He's also a wonderful, charming, humble and down-to-earth bloke.

I had a couple of Living Colour albums in my collection, but I must confess that I'd never really paid much attention to Will as a drummer. What I saw in Chicago, however, really knocked my socks off! The bit I managed to video doesn't do it any kind of justice.



Before Will's drum performance, mid-setting up, I was demonstrating one of my small gongs to some people at my booth. Next thing I know, Will is not on the far side of the hall setting up any more, but he's stood right in front of me. "What did you just play!?" The man has got an ear for sounds!


Fast forward a bit, to a couple of weeks ago. Back home in England, I'm going down to London for a couple of days for another music trade / public show. It just so happens that Will Calhoun is touring with his HeadFake duo with bass player Doug Wimbish and is playing in London. It was great to catch up with Will again, and to be introduced to Doug. Once again, I was wowed. Double or morefold this time. Those 2 can make one hell of a lot of noise for a duo! Very skilled use of triggered loops and live sampling, virtuoso playing and both guys singing their asses off. Some good rockstar gurning from Doug too. Awesome!


I'm looking forward to the up-coming Living Colour tour now. Something I've just got to catch...