2009

I’ve always been fascinated by old instrument catalogs and ads, and have wanted to create something similar for the guitars that I’ve made. There were several challenges that stood in the way of the project, first I suppose was making all the guitars and then getting pictures of them. Second was finding someone to take on the task, as I’m not that savvy when it comes to that type of thing. My buddy Jimmy Burns from Vermont, in addition to […]

I’ve had a full and busy summer and haven’t been too good about updating the blog. Sorry about that. I made a conscious decision at the beginning of the summer that I was going to try to make the most of it, spend a lot of time with my family and outdoors. Now that the weather is turning colder and the days are getting shorter, I’m sure I’ll be better about sitting down to record what’s been going on. I […]

A few years ago my friend Mike Ammons and I were looking at the liner notes to the very excellent CD of minstrel tunes, Good For What Ails You, on the Old Hat label, and Mike asked me “What kind of guitar is that?”, commenting on a picture of Daddy Stovepipe. I hadn’t really looked at the picture that closely as there are plenty of odd things going on, a musician in a top hat posing next to a recording […]

This weekend I celebrated five years of making my living solely as a guitar maker. I’ve been making and repairing them for much longer than that, but I made the leap from a nice cozy, secure construction job, for a life as a luthier. From a financial standpoint, it probably wasn’t the smartest move in the world, but I’m healthier and happier for it and I’ve been able to pursue my passion. The task would not have been possible without […]

My friend Hank Sapoznik presented me with the challenge of making a tenor guitar a little while back. I was not very familiar with the instrument and the role that it played in the music that Hank played. Hank is a fantastic 5 string banjo player and plays both claw hammer and classic three finger style for old time, hillbilly music, as well as a variety of rags. He primarily uses the tenor when he’s playing Klezmer. I wasn’t really […]

I recently had the honor of making a guitar for one of my musical heroes, Mike Seeger, . I can’t say enough good things about Mike. He’s a fantastic player, scholar and historian. In addition to being the first person to record Elizabeth Cotten, and the person who tracked down Doc Boggs, Mike is one of the people who made the world at large aware of old time traditional music, as well as Bluegrass. As a member of the New […]

I’ve been wanting to make a guitar for my friend Craig Ventresco for a long time. Craig is one of my favorite guitar players of all time. He plays real ragtime, drawing from source material that is neglected by the vast majority of musicians who attempt to play early American music. Craig has an incredible of knowledge of early popular music and plays it with the spirit and attack of some of my favorite early blues players, without attempting to […]

I recently made up a batch of 12 string tailpieces for some guitars in the current batch, so I figured I would document the process. The tailpieces I make were slightly modified from a tailpiece that came off of an old Stella 12 string. The guitar was an early 12 string (teens era) and the holes for the ball end strings were a little too small to accommodate modern strings. I made the holes a little larger and widened the […]

I mentioned the copy of Ernest Stoneman’s Galiano that I made, but realized that I haven’t explained the guitar yet. Here goes: Ernest Stoneman was one of the earliest people to record country music. He came before the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers, and actually had a hand in setting up the legendary Bristol Sessions. Stoneman played guitar, autoharp and harmonica, he was a great singer and songwriter. His real gift was as a bandleader. Stoneman assembled the Blue Ridge […]

This past weekend was quite eventful. My old friend John Hasbrouck came up to play a gig and visit. John and Matt Gandurski make up the world’s only all left handed resonator guitar and mandolin duet. The Northside Southpaws play a nice variety of rags, waltzes, tangos and bluegrass and put on a refreshing show. John has does a great job on the mandolin and Matt has really put in his time learning how to second on guitar, but is […]