TDJ-Issue-Three

the basic shape into it at the minute. I’ve various hammers with
different shaped faces and weights, depending on what sound I
want. I made them myself, too.”
“You can’t buy hammers?”
“They’re hard to get hold of. There’s a blacksmith in Kent who
makes Japanese sword smithing hammers. That’s the closest
thing really.”
After about 10 minutes my arm starts to twinge just watching
Matt repeatedly hammering the blank. “This one will require
at least 10,000 more hammer strokes,” he says, “to get it into
shape and so the metal is at the right tension. Once it starts
to take on the right shape I’ll let it rest for a couple of days to
let the metal recrystallize from the hammering. Then I’ll start
tweaking it with more hammering.”
I ask if Matt’s ever seen Rafael Nadal play tennis and noticed
how his left arm is a lot bigger than his right. “I actually noticed
that the other day,” Matt replies, flexing his arms and grinning.
“There’s definitely a difference with me, yeah. I did some
calculations based upon the amount of hammering I do but
it turned out I was still eating more than I was expending. So,
yeah, that was unfortunate.”
The Lathe
After hammering, the cymbal gets lathed to reduce its weight
and thin it out. “I can’t lathe this one just yet,” Matt states
holding up the blank, “but I can show you with this other
one I cracked.” He produces a nicely finished cymbal with an
impressive crack near the bell. It’s a sorry sight.
“How much work had you put in to that before it cracked?”
“About eight hours.” For some reason he grins when he says it.
“This is a good example of a metal you need a furnace to soften
up before you start hammering it. I was hammering on wood
too, which you shouldn’t really do. I lulled myself into a false
sense of security. I thought, ‘this stuff’s fine! It can take it!’ It
promptly cracked. But, I’ll be able to make something with it
still.”
“Can you just cut out the damage and make a feature out of it?”
I quickly realise that it was a stupid question the minute I say it.
“No, not really. If I put a hole there, and it’d be a big hole, the
cymbal will hang lop-sided when it’s on the stand. To counter
that, I’d have to put another hole on the other side to balance
it. Having holes in cymbals creates a place where the vibrations
can’t pass though because they just reflect, so you get a chaotic,
trashy sound.”
Matt moves across the room and mounts the cymbal upon the
lathe. Out of all the industrial equipment in the workshop,
this is the one most likely to draw your attention. Hand built
by Matt himself, it looks like the type of heavy machinery
pharmaceutical companies warn you not to use after taking
their medication. Open, exposed pulleys invite loose clothing,
long hair, and wandering fingers to be efficiently severed.
“It’s made from an old cabinet, railway sleepers, pulleys,
bearings, bits of an old bed, a motor from eBay, an old TV
stand, plywood...” he pauses. “There’s something else peculiar
but I’ve forgotten.”
I was slightly apprehensive when he started it up. I imagined
smoke pouring from the motor and gears grinding noisily.
Instead, it made barely a whisper; the wooden disc on to which
the cymbal is mounted issuing only a low hum as it spins
quickly. “I did a lot of head scratching when I was building this.