Posted on June 20, 2019May 14, 2025 by Dale Phillips Searching for Blue Significance Searching for Blue Significance by John Calkin previously published in American Lutherie #56, 1998 I guess I heard about Scott Chinery’s collection of blue guitars at the same time as everyone else. The photo of a necklace of sky-colored archtops lounging on the grass appeared in magazines well outside the field of music. And my reaction was probably the same as everyone else’s — where does this guy get his money? I was glad Chinery had dumped so much bread into the lutherie community, but otherwise I didn’t see the point. So when the staid Smithsonian Institution decided to house the collection for awhile, I was amused and confounded. What was going on here? I knew two things for sure. First, as a connoisseur of vintage instruments and a collector of wide renown, Scott Chinery was a man to be reckoned with. In the early ’90s he made a short video (available from Stew-Mac) which skimmed off some of the creamier bits of his collection for the home viewer, and let’s just say that any one piece would make any musician’s day turn golden. If the above question about his money seems rude, you should know that Chinery is very up-front about the subject on video and freely talks about what he paid for certain pieces and what sort of tempting offers he has refused for his vintage groovies. My friend and guitar teacher, Mitch Block, played a party at Chinery’s New Jersey home and came back stupefied by the shear quantity of fine (not to mention important) guitars he saw there. 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 15, 2025 by Dale Phillips Product Review: Stew-Mac Shaped Braces Product Review: Stew-Mac Shaped Dreadnought Braces Reviewed by John Calkin Originally published in American Lutherie #79, 2004 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Seven, 2015 Stewart-MacDonald kindly sent along a set of their shaped dreadnought braces for evaluation. This set up such an internal philosophical debate that I'd like to put off the brace examination for a minute. Just how much of an instrument can we job out and still call it our own? Two decades ago, when I was green and full of attitude, the answer was simple — none of it! Beginning luthiers often harbor a purist attitude that can leave them dreaming of harvesting their own trees, processing their own lumber, and drawing upon nothing from outside their shop but machine heads and strings. Those of us who have actually engaged in such activities have usually found them very satisfying but demanding the answer to another question: Do we want to be luthiers or lumberjacks? In other words, reality can bite us in the butt pretty early in the game. There is so much involved in building an instrument that calling for help in the form of commercial parts might be excused or even expected. Will a commercial truss rod degrade the quality of an instrument? No. Will a commercial bridge or pickguard devalue our work? I don't think so. OK, so how about a commercial set of braces? Suddenly it feels like we're heading into a different sort of territory. 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 15, 2025 by Dale Phillips Questions: Hammered Dulcimer Questions: Hammered Dulcimer by John Calkin Originally published in American Lutherie #81, 2005 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Seven, 2015 Gerald E. King from Conifer, Colorado asks: I am gathering material to construct a hammered dulcimer using GAL Instrument Plan #39. According to the plan’s creators Suran and Robison, the soundboard should be 1/4" thick, quartersawn mahogany. I have contacted several suppliers with no luck. Is this an unusually thick soundboard requirement? Is it an error in the plans? John Calkin from Greenville, Virginia replies: Hammered dulcimers have lots of string tension that would like to fold the instrument in half. A top as thick as 1/4" is necessary to help take the strain. Just about all my dulcimers had the top glued to the frame, and any weakness in the bracing of the top (or anywhere else) often led to distortions of the top that were seldom lethal but always ugly. There’s a construction method that uses a floating top of thinner material, but it has many more internal braces and is much more complicated to build. I’ve never made one. There’s so much tension on a dulcimer that even a thick top rings like a bell. 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 10, 2025 by Dale Phillips Questions: Adjustable Truss Rods Questions: Adjustable Truss Rods by John Calkin Originally published in American Lutherie #74, 2003 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Seven, 2015 Steven D’Antonio of Bellingham, Massachusetts asks: I have been using the Hot Rod 2-way Adjustable Truss Rods made by Stewart MacDonald for several years with good results. I have been placing them dead center in the neck without any problems that I am aware of. But recently I read something by John Calkin in AL stating that since the treble strings are under more tension than the bass, some luthiers offset their truss rods toward the treble to compensate for the imbalance in tensions. I asked Stew-Mac and also LMII for their advice, and they both suggested dead center placement for the truss rod. If you suggest offsetting towards the treble, how much is enough? John Calkin of Greenville, Virginia answers: It’s pretty common to find that when the neck of a guitar with some age on it is adjusted, the treble side still has a slight bow after the bass side of the fingerboard is flat. Pulling out the bow on the treble side will often fret out some of the bass notes nearest the nut. Usually this is a minor affair, but occasionally the only fix is some fret filing or even a refret after the fretboard has been trued. I tend to think of this as an electric guitar problem, but that may only be because electric guitarists are more obsessive about having the lowest possible action. 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 11, 2025 by Dale Phillips Questions: Choosing Top Wood Questions: Choosing Top Wood by John Calkin Originally published in American Lutherie #84, 2005 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Seven, 2015 Jerry Tekell of Italy, Texas asks: As a person somewhat new to instrument building I’d like to ask: Why do most builders use spruce or pine for guitar and mandolin tops? Why not maple, for example? I’d love to use maple on the top as well as the back of my mandolins, but I wonder how it would sound. John Calkin, GAL Contributing Editor, responds: Softwoods (conifers) are traditional for instrument tops, which also makes them what customers expect to see. Don’t neglect the importance of this. There are real-world reasons, though, as well. A wood needs to be strong enough to withstand the forces of string tension and compression (if you are talking about an archtop mandolin) and also light enough to be set in motion effectively by string vibration. Quartersawn softwoods seem to fit the bill better than the wood from deciduous trees. I tend to think of softwoods as fluffy, since they have a lot of air trapped in their structures. Hardwoods like hard maple are more like a metal (in my mind, not in reality) since they are very dense. 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.
