#181
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Quote:
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Yamaha Pacifica 512, Yamaha APX6, Alhambra 7c, Taylor 110 (w/upgraded Taylor gold tuners!), Alhambra 7p, Yamaha CS-40, Samick Corsair Pawn-Shop Special Bass |
#182
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So inquiring minds and all...How was the Blue Grass festival this year?
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#183
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The festival was slow, perhaps less than half its historical attendance. 7 luthiers in our pavilion rather than 20 or so, and much less jamming in the campground, so probably proportionately fewer pickers in the population. Still, after over 20 consecutive years of participation, I got to hang out with many friends I see almost nowhere else.
One of the younger pickers, John Gooding, came to play my new BRW dread at least 5 times and surely would buy it if he could. But he is 18 and just launching his adult life, so he’d need a patron to pull that off. I got video of John play it and his brother Josh playing an F style mandolin I own, but will have to process it before I can share it with you. Which I will. |
#184
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but will have to process it before I can share it with you.
I'm looking forward to it, your BRW guitar looks really interesting... -Mike |
#185
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Adult life???
Launching his adult life at 18???
This made me laugh…. I am 71 and still doing my best to avoid adult life! Carry on Bruce, and have FUN Paul
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3 John Kinnaird SS 12c CUSTOMS: Big Maple/Cedar Dread Jumbo Spanish Cedar/WRC Jumbo OLD Brazilian RW/WRC R.T 2 12c sinker RW/Claro 96 422ce bought new! 96 LKSM 12 552ce 12x12 J. Stepick Bari Weissy WRC/Walnut More |
#186
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Every time I do a video link I have to face my own techno-deficiencies. Perhaps I should do it more often!
Here are brothers John and Josh Gooding jamming near my table at the Grass Valley Bluegrass Festival last father's day weekend. The room is pretty live and a lot of people are talking, so the fidelity is not quite recording studio quality. John plays my new BRW/Adi D and Josh plays my Schneider F5 mandolin, both of which I hope NOT to own forever. https://vimeo.com/723553420 Here is the embed code, if anyone knows how to use it: <iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/723553420?h=f22799c153" width="640" height="564" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowfullscreen></iframe> |
#187
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There was nothing wrong with that! Sounded good to me. If I could only flatpick, . . . .
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1891 Martin 1-21 1924 Martin 0-21 1930 Martin (employee) 00-28 1936 Martin 0-18 2018 Collings 000-18C 2019 JC Baxendale 0-18C 2020 Sexauer FT-0C 2021 Sexauer FT-L00 |
#188
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Bruce has been rather busy with a couple new projects, so hasn't checked in here recently, sadly. But he’s never not doing anything, and I finally had a little time to drop by and grab a bite of lunch with him and another luthier friend, Brad Hall, just to catch up. After lunch we played a few guitars, including his recent olive guitar, and a stunning mahogany guitar, both he’s planning to take to Woodstock. Unfortunately, he hadn’t finished assembling the satinwood dread, which I’d like to hear, so next visit - I did get to try his very first Schoenberg prototype, which has been around the block a few times, but sounded really great.
He did a little check-up and adjustment on the Mad Rose he built me, bringing the action down about half a 64th since it’s now a couple years old, and then we started talking about electrics and pickups, and pulled out a couple of his archtops - Bruce has made a few of these, and has 2 in the shop, a maple one that he plays out with, and a stunning cherry one that I think he’s trying to interest me in (not hard). Both hadn’t been played for a couple years, so he gave them a dust-off and a little tweak, then decided that he needed to adjust the spacing at the saddle to fit the pickups better, so he adjusted both saddles, tweaked the action, and adjusted the intonation - using a technique I’d be scared to try, but in the hands of a master, I don’t question it - and he got it on the money very quickly! Freshly set-up and plugged in, they are both great sounding instruments. Not likely he’ll build any more archtops - lots of work, and he keeps talking about using up more of his collection of Brazilian, and Pernambuco, and Myrtle, and others, while I still think he should build more mahogany - love his mahogany guitars - but eventually, we put everything away and had a lovely dinner with his wife on their patio. Doesn’t get much better than that - Next time I’ll try to remember to get better pics -
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More than a few Santa Cruz’s, a few Sexauers, a Patterson, a Larrivee, a Cumpiano, and a Klepper!! |
#189
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Thanks for the update. Bruce's thread -- in fact the whole Custom Shop section -- has been pretty quiet, so it's good to hear that interesting guitar things are still happening!
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#190
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As Tad mentioned, Bruce played a couple of his Woodstock bound guitars. He always has a critical ear and decided one was superior in some fashion to another, until he played the other. What a dilemma to be in! If you haven’t had the pleasure of hearing or playing a Sexauer guitar it’s difficult to describe just how wonderful they really are. Seldom mentioned is what a great player Bruce is. In that respect he is very humble. From my perspective hearing a master play his own creations, it doesn’t get much better.
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BradHall _____________________ |
#191
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These guys rarely do nothing….
Quote:
I LOVE the pic of Bruce in the shop with the music stand behind him…. Yay for PLAYING Paul
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3 John Kinnaird SS 12c CUSTOMS: Big Maple/Cedar Dread Jumbo Spanish Cedar/WRC Jumbo OLD Brazilian RW/WRC R.T 2 12c sinker RW/Claro 96 422ce bought new! 96 LKSM 12 552ce 12x12 J. Stepick Bari Weissy WRC/Walnut More |
#192
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Ceylon Satinwood JB-16
This week I completed the last guitar I have on my bench, with nothing more "in the pipe" at the moment.
Some of you may recall that I wrote most of a book a few years back. It is autobiographical, anecdotal, possibly humorous, and has enough technical information in to build a guitar using the techniques I have developed over the span of my career, not to mention several hundred in-focus photographs. I connected with a self styled editor back then who discouraged me from proceeding, and I put the project on the back burner until a couple of months ago when I met another editor who is ecstatic about the project. Yes, I may be a bit insecure in my non-lutherie artistic efforts. My new editor, Tim Allen, read my entire text and made about 650 corrections and comments, socially obligating me to pick up the ball. I am over halfway though vetting his work, and have added a few thousand words as well. I am about halfway through the first edit and if I start a new instrument right now I will be unlikely to complete the vetting/writing before the end of August, which is my goal. Tim is also the current president of the Northern California Association of Luthier, a title I gave up to him about 6 moths ago. He has built several guitars and is increasingly influenced by my techniques. Now you know why I've been quiet here in the forum. Today I made a page for the new guitar which can be viewed HERE. This is my "big gun", a fully asymmetrical JB-16, similar to the guitar that Walter Strauss is currently playing, and will go head to head with the Olsons/Ryans/Petros's of the world. The Ceylon Satinwood was a gift from one of our forum members. And here are just a couple of the dozen pictures on that page: |
#193
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Beautiful JB Bruce…
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A bunch of nice archtops, flattops, a gypsy & nylon strings… |
#194
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Good luck with the book. Be sure to let us (me) know when it and if is published. This is a very tough industry, now more than ever (I speak from recent experience). Remember, re-writing is your friend: Annie Proulx told me once she typically does 50 re-writes on a given book. I find that most improvement, like in writing songs, comes with making it more compact, saying more with less words.
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The Bard Rocks Fay OM Sinker Redwood/Tiger Myrtle Sexauer L00 Adk/Magnolia For Sale Hatcher Jumbo Bearclaw/"Bacon" Padauk Goodall Jumbo POC/flamed Mahogany Appollonio 12 POC/Myrtle MJ Franks Resonator, all Australian Blackwood Goodman J45 Lutz/fiddleback Mahogany Blackbird "Lucky 13" - carbon fiber '31 National Duolian + many other stringed instruments. Last edited by The Bard Rocks; 07-29-2022 at 08:06 PM. |
#195
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Bruce, I am pretty much over-the-moon that you’ve taken up the book again! I look forward to seeing how it progresses!
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Treenewt |