Albey Balgochian Choosing Between Two Passions
In the world of luthiers, you fight for every sale. You walk away from no opportunity, you take nothing for granted. So, what would motivate Albey Balgochian, builder of the world renowned 'A Basses', to do exactly that? Bass Inside wanted to know and we figured you might, too.
He builds for the best. Stanley Clarke loves his stuff, as do Reggie Scanlan and Darryl Jones. With fans like this, why would anyone ever walk away?
The answer is simple ... He is and always was a player. When a success story like A Basses starts crushing your other love, there comes a time to make a choice. Albey's biggest supporter, his wife Jane, and he sorted out what was really important to him, and the playing came out on top.
Now, he felt responsibility to his customers and he still wanted to make a difference out there in the world of basses, so he had to find a solution to that as well. In this chat, we take a look at some of his choices and why he made them.
Bass Inside: What brought you to the big change, from luthier to player?
Albey: I have always been a player. I was a player first and always. Up until recently I had always made my basses around my playing schedule. I ended up trying to juggle two careers. Now one benefit of all this was, when a player told me of a problem he was having, not only had I probably experienced the same problem at one point or another, but fortunately I had an idea on how to solve it. But for me, it was always that I was a bassplayer making basses. Not the other way around.
Bass Inside: What was it that finally made you no longer want to be an active luthier?
Albey: Basically, the two careers were demanding more and more of my attention. Bass building had gotten to a point where I could no longer keep up with it without putting aside something else. I wouldn't be playing anymore. And I just can't have it that way!
It was funny though, as soon as Jane and I put it up on the website that we were accepting no new orders, everybody who had ever thought of getting an A Bass ordered! I had to tell them all that I wouldn't and couldn't do it.
But you have Lakland taking over one of your models?
Yes, the Darryl Jones bass. This is basically a J Bass, but with the options, it makes it a Darryl Jones Bass. So Darryl and I looked around for a good company to approach.
I had played some Lakland Basses and I had some friends in downtown Boston that owned repair shops. I asked them if they had ever had any Lakland's come through their shops. They said they were high quality basses, and I got good reviews from all of them. So Darryl and I approached them and struck up a deal that was nice for everyone.
Albey with his UprightNow I have a lot of designs so I will probably approach them or someone else with those. That will be a way to still have basses being made. Including the upright. That's what we are looking into for the future.
I do enjoy making basses, I just don't like the pressure of production. Any of those that are done will be placed on the website for sale.
Albey recently sent us two CDs with examples of the music he will be following. Two very avant-garde groups of tunes, like nothing I have ever encountered before.
That is the direction I will be headed. These two are a compilation of all my playing. I have always thought that you should be able to pick up the instrument and have a conversation with that instrument.
I always thought music would be like this. It has taken me a long time to get the point where I can express what I need to another musician. I mean without scores and transcriptions and things like that.
The two I sent you are the latest versions of those ideas. That is what I am heading towards in the largest way I can.
Is there a fair bit of work where you live in Boston?
There are a lot of musicians, and a lot of bands as well. Granted, a lot of them are just students that are here while they are going to school. These people will play for very little money.
Which of course the club owner loves because he is in the business of alcohol sales, not music
promotion.
Yeah, now of course I will have to go after those gigs, but in the long run I am after something much larger. More long term and actual tours. Not just around here in Boston.
Now probably the intelligent thing would be for me to jump all over the bass building business, to really run with it. I know I am at the point where I could really make a big jump with it.
But I am telling you that I have enough experience to know that that jump would be the end of playing. That just can't be done. There is just not enough space for me to do that and be the improvisational musician I am.
I am not the sort of person that retires to weekend playing. I have been going at it very seriously the whole time.
So are you at this point working a lot with your band?
Well, at this point this is all pretty new. Mainly I had been a sideman. Everything kind of came together all at the same time. I am putting together the promo package at this point, it is all that new.
Albey is looking to online music clinics as well, having done them at Berklee. Also he would like to develop, as he calls it, a 'care and feeding of your instrument' section where he could answer any questions you may have on your instrument. He is also considering making DVDs as well for instructional work as well as a platform for his music and his artwork and drawings.
Now how will you convey the ideas for your music to your fellow musicians in the new band?
Well, I pretty much have my own vocabulary for my music these days. What I do pretty much is that I tell the story of what I am trying to portray to my guys as opposed to writing out anything. So what happens is I tell you the story or I give you the description of the emotion I am trying to convey.
I tell the drummer "I want you to play water hitting a little rock. If you don't see it, you can't play it and if you can't play it, our audience is not going to hear it."
Now a lot of musicians will be intimidated by this. Have your musicians grown familiar enough with this line of thinking that they welcome it?
Well, I have a small extended group of people that have been coming over to play with me a lot and are understanding me more and more. Now of course I have people that come over and then tell me I am nuts. So they leave. But that's totally cool, I have played attached to musical notation, I have done that, but I have moved past that. I now play totally the way I see it and feel it.
It is a time of great promise, pressure and adventure for Albey and it takes no small amount of courage to do this. He might succeed, he might not. There might be some consolation in knowing he retains his world class status as a luthier and if need be, he can always go back to that.
But speaking to him, there is a resolve there that really won't allow this. Although the music is very advanced, very freeform, these were the strengths that made A Basses the respected name they were. That focus, that drive likely will produce the same result in his music. Visit his site, still A Basses, and judge for yourself. Be prepared, however, to go some places you haven't been before. While you are there, leave him a note on what you think. He is an open-minded individual that will welcome your input, and in the process you might just learn some new things as well.