Posted on March 12, 2020May 23, 2025 by Dale Phillips It’s a Kabosy It’s a Kabosy by Paul Hostetter Originally published in American Lutherie #35, 1993 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 Madagascar is a huge island about the size of Washington, Oregon, and California combined. Situated 180° around the earth in any direction from these three states, this single-language country lies in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa. I shall probably recount more about music from Madagascar than about construction details of this delightful little instrument for this simple reason: the kabosy’s musical raison d’être exceeds in interest the technical complexity of the instrument itself. Nonetheless, it’s worth a long look because, like most things Malagasy, there’s nothing quite like it anywhere else. Despite obvious superficial appearances, Malagasy culture is not particularly African at all, but is an extraordinary mélange of Polynesian, Southeast Asian, Arabic, African, and, more recently, European influences. (Madagascar was a French colony until 1972.) Like the legendary flora and fauna of that far-away island, Malagasy culture and music bear but a passing resemblance to culture elsewhere on the planet. Fortunately there are numerous recordings now available of just about every stripe of this remarkable musical culture. A discography follows. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on August 23, 2019May 23, 2025 by Dale Phillips Intonation in the Real World Intonation in the Real World by Mike Doolin from his 2006 GAL Convention lecture previously published in American Lutherie #92, 2007 Getting guitars to play in tune has been a major topic of interest for many years, both for guitar players and guitar makers, and it has been a major source of frustration as well. During our current “Golden Age of Lutherie” the bar has been raised for standards of craft, playability, and tonal quality, as players have become more sophisticated in their expectations and builders have become better educated and more demanding of their own work. Expectations for accurate intonation have come along with all that: it’s no longer acceptable for a guitar to only play in tune for the first five frets, or in a few keys. Modern players are using the whole neck, exploring extended harmonies, and playing in ensembles with other instruments. They are looking for instruments that play in tune with themselves and with the rest of the musical world. It turns out that guitar intonation is a huge can of worms, because it is really two topics: ▶ What does it mean to be “in tune?” ▶ How do I make a guitar do that? Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on January 19, 2010September 9, 2025 by Dale Phillips Questions: String Compensation Questions: String Compensation by Mike Doolin Originally published in American Lutherie #69, 2002 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Six, 2013 Brett from cyberspace asks: I had always been of the opinion that saddle compensation was to overcome the tendency of a thicker string to be less amenable to vibrate than a thin one. So a high E will be vibrating close to the saddle, and a low E, being stiffer, will start vibrating a bit further away, hence compensation. That idea gave me peace for a while because I really couldn’t see the tiny distance a string gets pushed down to the fret as making any significant difference. The kicker, though, is that if I believe that theory, the string isn’t vibrating at all where it touches the saddle. If that’s the case, how does the vibration actually travel to the body and neck? If I follow my logic further, I’ve got to concede that the vibration is a type of compressive function in which the string compresses the axe as it gets to the widest part of its travel, lets it off as it passes through the resting point, and compresses it again as it zooms out to the widest point of its vibration on the other side, with maybe a slight forward bending of the guitar at the tightest points of the vibration (because the string isn’t lying flat on the fretboard). If a vibrating string’s tension isn’t constant, won’t a strongly-picked string tend to be sharp? Further, won’t it tend to go sharp-flat-sharp as it vibrates in decreasing cycles as it runs out of energy? It’s nano stuff I know, but I’ve always wondered. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on January 19, 2010September 9, 2025 by Dale Phillips Product Reviews: Frets.com CD Product Reviews: Frets.com CD by Fred Carlson Originally published in American Lutherie #62, 2000 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Six, 2013 Frets.com CD I don’t know how many clones luthier/repairman Frank Ford (Gryphon Stringed Instruments, Palo Alto, California) has made of himself, but we in the lutherie world can be thankful that they all devote vast amounts of time to furthering the luthing cause. At least, it sure seems like there’s got to be more than one of him, considering all the stuff he’s got going. I ran into Frank recently at one of the bimonthly meetings of NCAL (the Northern California Association of Luthiers) where he updated attendees on his latest and ongoing ventures. These included a couple of things that fit into the product category and seemed worthy of mention here. I’ve been intending to figure out a way to justify a more detailed mention of Franks’ amazing lutherie web page, www.frets.com, in one of these columns. I’ve made note of frets.com in the past, but I hadn’t yet figured out how to put a product spin on it. After all, although it is undeniably the product of an enormous amount of work and dedication, a website is essentially bits of digital information on a computer somewhere, freely accessed by anyone with a computer and an Internet connection. This is pretty different stuff than router jigs and fret files. It’s more like a book, only you don’t obtain a hard copy of it. (Unless you do an awful lot of downloading to your computer printer!) Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on January 10, 2010May 23, 2025 by Dale Phillips Product Reviews: Dan Erlewine’s Don’t Fret video Product Reviews: Dan Erlewine's Don't Fret video by Harry Fleishman Originally published in American Lutherie #34, 1993 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 Dan Erlewine’s Don’t Fret video and specialized tools Stewart-MacDonald www.stewmac.com I will never forget my first fret job. It was a balmy spring evening; the jasmine were blooming. The year was 1964. We were alone in my bedroom, just me and my Strat. I was an anxious sixteen year old. She was a blonde, born in ’62. This was nine years before I saw a copy of Irving Sloane’s groundbreaking book on repair, so when I decided to fix a few badly worn frets I was on my own. The worst wear was on the 2nd string, 1st fret and the 1st string, 3rd fret; the rest were still pretty good. Out came the soldering gun! No, I wasn’t planning to carefully remove the offending frets for replacement; I was going to fill the grooves with solder! I heated up the frets and flowed a bit of solder on. After they cooled, I smoothed them over with the file on my nail clipper. They looked great and I felt heroic. That is the proper technique, isn’t it? Nearly thirty years later, I know better. I should have used a soldering iron, not a gun. The gun could have demagnetized the pickups! Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
