[dtxtremeiiispecial]

I hope you're right, man. My hat's off to you. You've made a true search, going to Turkey, hearing the secrets from the local people, finding the ancient cymbals, and actually playing them -- and hearing them. I'm just sittin' here in a chair.

But I listen to the thoughts that come into my head, thoughts like this:

I know nothing about cymbal-making, but I do know a little about knifemaking, and in knifemaking the alloy is not as important as the heat treatment. A knife made of mediocre steel but properly heat-treated will outperform a knife of the best steel that is not heat-treated or that receives inadequate heat treatment. A cymbal containing gold might make a better alloy, but wouldn't the real secret lie in the heat treatment? (When the Zildjian company moved from Turkey to the USA, they still bought their coal from the same company they had used when in Turkey -- that shows concern about heat treatment.)

Point of fact. It is my understanding that Zildjian has never claimed to possess the secret of the "ancient cymbal makers." Their claim is that Avedis Zildjian 1 stumbled on a good cymbal alloy while trying to create gold from base metals. The Zildjian secret alloy is what he stumbled upon -- not some ancient cymbal maker's secret. And in fact, much of the world agreed that these were better cymbals than the others that existed at the time.

Point of fact. Ancient cymbal makers existed in Mesopotamia and China too, not just Turkey.

You point out that gold is $1,000 an ounce. But in our history gold at that price is the exception, not the rule. Gold has spent decades not being a decent investment and at a much lower price.

I don't know any cymbal makers who use gold today, but then, I've never researched it. The Wikipedia article says some do. And mostly, I just believe gold has been tried as an alloy at one time or another as cymbal makers experiment to improve their products. Are you saying this has never happened?

Like I said, I hope you're right. I hope you end up with the best damn sounding cymbals in the universe. I'll buy 'em. And I've got to hand it to you -- you're goin' for the gold!