A truly original craftsman and custom cymbalsmith, Mike Skiba became most renowned for his unique cymbal designs.



Mike Skiba grew up in a small ranch house, the last in a tiny neighborhood set in the woods of Brick, New Jersey. The full basement was equipped as a fully functional machine shop from which my father ran a diverse business of specialty and custom fabrication, pattern-making, tool and die work, cabinet-making and furniture repair, machine shop jobbing, and all manner of repair and consultation services for many local industrial foundries and manufacturers.



Mike Skiba started drumming when he was nine years old. He grew up in a musical house in New Jersey with four brothers. Their father was a violinist. Mike liked banging on stuff, so he got a snare drum. Mike: "When I got older, I played in bars down here at the Jersey shore and did pretty well for a while. One time I wanted to upgrade my drums and cymbals, but when I went around to the stores and saw the prices of new equipment, it was discouraging. I had the idea to make my own cymbals, and got together with my dad, who was very familiar with bronze. He had a lot of contacts at foundries down here, and those guys knew bronze. With some help, we made cymbals for me. They didn’t sound great, but it was a start."



In fact, in the 1970's the Skiba family was the first in the area to have the skill to drill Ludwig's new Vistalite drums for bottom lugs. And Mike started doing custom cymbal work in exchange for sticks and heads at the local music store.



Mike Skiba got away from drums and cymbals for about a decade, but in 1993 he set a shop in his basement to continue cymbal working and custom drum building.



Mike Skiba passed away at the age of 50 on Saturday, November 13, 2010.