Posted on October 22, 2026November 5, 2026 by Dale Phillips Plate Bending for Bowed and Plucked Instruments Plate Bending for Bowed and Plucked Instruments by Nupi Jenner Originally published in American Lutherie #123, 2015 We wanted to find a practicable solution for bending the plates of bowed or plucked instruments to the desired arching, before carving. Tops and backs built in this way have different physical properties than those carved out of flat pieces of wood. Our intention was to perhaps recover an old technique used by instrument makers for centuries. It’s a method that saves a lot of time and material, but it can be an acoustical challenge for those who are used to working in the traditional way. English viol makers of the 17th century made tops out of seven pieces of bent wood. Was this due to scarcity of wood of the right size, or for tonal reasons? We cannot say. But the bent tops seem to contribute to the typical bright sound of these instruments. As the direction of the wood fibers follows the arching of the plate, fewer fibers are cut through during the final carving process. This increases the stiffness and allows working the plates thinner than usual. In our opinion, this reduction of weight improves the ease of playing response notably. 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 September 23, 2026October 2, 2026 by Dale Phillips Plywood Bass Restoration, Part One Plywood Bass Restoration, Part One from his 2011 GAL Convention workshop by James Condino Originally published in American Lutherie #109, 2012 See also, Plywood Bass Restoration, Part Two by James Condino There were five different bass shops in Portland, where I used to live. Nobody came to me looking for help with a bass. About five years ago I moved to Asheville, North Carolina. Asheville, like most towns, has a million guitar players and lots of builders, but you have to drive 150 miles in any direction to find someone else who works on an upright bass — especially someone who plays. Within about ten months, just hiding in my dusty little shop with no advertising, I was the bass guy in North Carolina. A lot of people ask why I want to work on those old plywood things that take up so much space. Just nine days working on basses allows me to do whatever I want for the rest of the month; then I can go back to making funny-looking green mandolins and prototype stuff. From a customer standpoint, bass players are the most gentle, mild-mannered, low-maintenance people I work with. They usually don’t ask for help until the action’s so high they physically can’t play it. After dealing with mandolin buyers, who will blow a gasket if it’s off .001˝ on the first fret, it’s like being on vacation. 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 September 23, 2026October 2, 2026 by Dale Phillips Plywood Bass Restoration, Part Two Plywood Bass Restoration, Part Two from his 2011 GAL Convention workshop by James Condino Originally published in American Lutherie #110, 2012 See also, Plywood Bass Restoration, Part One by James Condino Anyone who works on old plywood basses is probably familiar with Chuck Traeger’s book, The Setup and Repair of the Double Bass for Optimum Sound. It’s the bible for plywood repair and I reviewed it in AL#84. It’s about 300 pages; $75 at Amazon. I spend more than that for one string. I recommend that you buy it from Henry Strobel. He’s in Aumsville, Oregon, outside of Salem. He’s written most of the violin books that we have, and he has a publishing company. One of my students liked my copy more than I did, so I don’t have one for the show. The book really gets beyond simple things like replacing the bass bar, into jobs like mode matching the differences between the fingerboard and the tailpiece. Chuck was the first guy to publish information about these breast patches on the soundboard; they make quite a difference in the response of a Kay. His new book is basically an addendum. I think he wanted to get the information out rather than wait for the next printing. It’s fairly common to use some sort of graft material when you’re working on braces. The plies are weak, and it often happens that when the bass takes a hit, the bass bar sticks to the wood but the plies delaminate. I picked up the idea of a big graft from Chuck’s book. He uses linen, and that’s a popular material. Some people like natural parchment or goatskin, and drumheads are good too. You can buy them really thin (some almost too thin to sell), and for ten bucks you can get a big patch that works well. I ran out of material, so I went down to an old-school sewing shop in North Carolina. I took my little boy with me, and as soon as we walked in the door, all the old ladies with big hats were on us, petting his head and stuff. I told them what I wanted to do, and they put their heads together and found the best stuff in the shop for the job: it’s the substrate you use for needlepoint. Do you know what I mean by needlepoint? A big hoop and frame, and you load this material into it and you cross-stitch in and out? 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 September 11, 2026October 15, 2026 by Dale Phillips Magnetic Pickups and the Electric Violin Magnetic Pickups and the Electric Violin by John W. Silzel Originally published in American Lutherie #105, 2011 Buffalo, New York, October 22, 1928; Victor A. Pfeil files a patent application titled simply “Musical Instrument” which becomes U.S. Patent 1,861,717 on June 7, 1932. Pfeil’s patent drawings show a startlingly modern-looking instrument that relied not on aged spruce and maple for its sound, but on a magnetic pickup and a pair of vacuum tubes. It was possibly the world’s first electric instrument: a violin. Meanwhile, around 1931, in his Los Angeles living room, George Beauchamp was building a guitar, also with magnetic pickups. George and his friend Adolf Rickenbacker began selling the banjo-shaped “A-22,” which George had nicknamed the “Frying Pan,” in 1932. Beauchamp’s “Frying Pan” was the great-grandfather of the electric guitar that would eventually find its way into the hands of young Johnny Alan “Jimi” Hendrix. In fact, the single-coil magnetic guitar pickups sold today remain remarkably similar to the bobbin and coil shown in Beauchamp’s patent drawings. Their “Frying Pan” guitar was a success, and on January 14, 1936, Beauchamp and Rickenbacker filed another patent application, this time for an electric violin featuring a single-coil pickup (Fig. 1) with four staggered pole pieces located directly underneath the strings, guitar style.1 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 August 4, 2026August 4, 2026 by Dale Phillips Beginner vs. the Fiddle Kit Beginner vs. the Fiddle Kit by Dave Raley Originally published in American Lutherie #110, 2012 Why would an experienced luthier want to build the Stewart-MacDonald Fiddle Kit? Probably wouldn’t. But some of us are beginners with limited tools. I go into detail here about the errors that I made so that others may avoid those errors. Stew-Mac’s kit is surprisingly complete, but there are pitfalls; here and there the manual assumes that you know as much as the kit master. The greatest gift was that the ribs were already bent. They and the blocks were already glued to the back, which was carved and sanded. The top was also carved and sanded, f-holes cut, and purfling grooves excavated almost enough. The tailpiece wanted only assembly with the tailgut. Strings, pegs, fine tuner, chinrest, end pin, soundpost blank, bass bar blank, bridge, purfling; all there. If you don’t waste any purfling you will have a few inches left over. A soundpost setter is included. You will need a lot more rubber bands than provided. 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.
