Armand Zildjian, who for more than two decades headed the nearly 400-year-old family company that provides cymbals to some of the best-known percussionists appearing on concert and club stages, has died aged 81 in Arizona.
Everyone with a radio or a compact disc player has probably heard a Zildjian cymbal thousands of times .
Among those who use the K Constantinople, the K Custom Special Dry HiHat, the A Zildjian & Cie vintage ride, or any one of dozens of other models are musicians ranging from Ringo Starr, who is said to have used the A Zildjian line on all of the classic Beatles recordings, to Lars Ulrich of Metallica, Ginger Baker of Cream and Mitch Mitchell, Jimi Hendrix's drummer.
Armand Zildjian was heir to a business that originated in 1623 in Constantinople .
His ancestor, Avedis, who was looking for a way to turn metal into gold, stumbled upon an alloy formula combining tin, copper and a little silver in a sheet of metal that could emit a crashing sound without cracking.
Avedis was renamed Zildjian - "zil" is Turkish for cymbal, "ji" means maker and "ian" is the Armenian suffix for "son of" - and launched a business that harboured the secret formula, passed on from oldest son to oldest son for about a dozen generations, including to Armand's father, Avedis Zildjian III.
When Armand Zildjian's father died, however, he wanted to be fair to his two sons, so he revealed the secret to both Armand and his younger brother, Robert.
Thus ensued a legal battle that resulted in Robert breaking away in 1981 to form Sabian, a Canadian competitor to Zildjian.
By the mid-20th century, Zildjian was the leading provider of what had become a nearly indispensable instrument for jazz groups, rock 'n' roll bands and school and symphony orchestras.
It later began producing drumsticks. Its sales in 2001 totaled $37 million, according to the company.
Armand Zildjian was born in Quincy, Massachussetts.
He attended Colgate University before serving in the Pacific with the US Coast Guard during the second World War.
After the war, he returned to work in his father's factory in the melting room and the shipping room.
He was appointed company president in 1977 and chairman in 1979.
Armand Zildjian: born 1921, died December 26th,2002.