Sunday, June 18, 2017

Handmade Guitar

Today I found some more of the early 'gear' I used in my beginning stages of recording music and sound. I want to share some photos of that equipment just to show the experimentation and creativity of those early days. There is a lot of stuff from my childhood days stored in my garage and I hope to get to them all this year. That is, provided they still exist. I have a large amount of drawings I used to do and I really long to find them.

My first guitar was one my father carved out of wood for me. It's a flat piece of wood with no sound box so it isn't really a playable guitar. It had fishing line on it as strings and I used it more for percussive effect than melodic. Also it's only eleven inches long so it was never really meant to be a 'just for fun' type of thing. Here are some photos of it:




I have many recordings that feature this little guitar. Back in those days my other 'instruments' included:

- a tiny Casio keyboard
- a 4 thick rubber band bass instrument
- a multiple rubber band electric guitar instrument
- coffee and candy cans for drums
- small jingle bells for a tambourine
- tree seed pods for maracas

Some of these things no longer exist. Others do and as I find my 'vintage gear' I will post it here. I do however still have most of the recordings I made from those days. But in connection with Father's Day today I wanted to show the first guitar I ever had, made by my father.