Posting alongside today's 🔗Patreon video about Macro- and Micro-Shape when learning cymbal making, here's a brief response I sent to a student asking about achieving sounds through shapes.
As many of my students know, I like to say "Shape is Sound". What does that mean? Over the coming weeks I'll be posting essays and insights diving into my thinking around this and many other subjects.
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Basically, "shape" doesn't just mean the curve of the cymbal. You'll need to start thinking of it in a zoomed-in micro sense also, meaning that each hammer stroke is an element of the shape, the combination of strokes is shape, the landscape of the thing in the compression and joining of neighbouring strokes and lathe lines is shape, the varying thickness thanks to hammering *and* lathing is shape, whether designed or unavoidable... essentially you get to decide how you arrive at the desired zoomed-out / macro shape depending on what you're trying to achieve.
You can generate the same curvature, and therefore some of the same base characteristics, via any number of ways of applying hammer strokes and lathing. If you're using minimal hammering with a wide-faced hammer to get the macro shape you're looking for, chances are there will be a softness / dryness / lower register to the cymbal because of the unprocessed metal.
Work-hardening achieves hardness, as the name suggests, which translates to a musicality. How about aiming for the same macro shape (the zoomed out appearance) with much more hammering? Not deep, pin-head hammering so as to deform and buckle things, but controlled spreading work to slowly pull the shape where you want it while also covering the surface with hardening information?
Perhaps then do the majority of lathing on the underside - this can help with strength by pushing the curve stronger (just be careful of losing structural integrity!) and then a basic pass on top meaning you don't strip away the hardened surface too much and arrive at the softer core, which would give a softer response overall.
I also suggest going beyond what you're aiming for with hammering, in order to bring it back to "finished" with lathing, by which I mean overtighten the cymbal to like 120%, whatever that means, so that lathing seats it back to 100%.
With the lathing, perhaps add some quicker "pin" passes, as folk like to call it, for some high end sizzle. A couple of fast passes in each direction can generate all sorts of interference patterns which help with complexity, and as the channels are tight and severe, this translates into high-end information.
A way to add "sheen" after the fact and bring out some brightness is to buff the surface back after lathing, I like to use some WD40 and a sheet of 5000-grit wet-and-dry sandpaper, perhaps also a buffing wheel in my handheld drill. Just slow, smooth application of this gives a shine which brings out a lovely shine in the sound, but also feels like it kind of ages it a little and takes back harshness in the mid and low ranges.
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I'll add that these are all purely my own ideas and observations as a self-taught cymbalsmith, and originally sent in response to a specific question. Presented here as seeds of thought, or an insight around which to think and find your own understanding.