Billy Strings and Don Julin - awesome Bluegrass surprise!

[jolli]

Have seen Don and Billy a couple of times in N. Mich. and each time I have been amazed! They also had a 9 yr. old, Nik Carmen, opening for them once. His guitar and banjo skills reminded me that I have a long way to go…..
http://interlochenpublicradio.org/po...eady-spotlight

[Bingoccc]

Zombie thread warning

Wife's out of town.. I've watched a number of their YTubes on the TV tonight. They are both phenoms. Check them out if you get the chance!

[CB Alyn]

D. Cannon. Roy Noble is a good friend of friend, I met him in 1963 at LA Valley College unfortunately his health has gone bad and he is no longer building .I learned to build from Roy Noble, in the 1960 & early 1970's along Mark Whitebook. I was in the shoppe an helped build #0069 three peice brasilian/sitka dreadnought for Bob Warford in the summer of 1967. There were four amazing guitar built that summer, and I helped building all of them #0067 which was mine, #0068 which went to Pete Seeger, #0069 to Bob and #0070 which went to James Dickey the poet and novelist who wrote "Deliverance" Clarence traded his white telecaster to Bob for his Noble and that is the guitar that he played exclusively on all recordings of the Mule Skinners, Nashville West, Kentucky Colonels and the Byrds until a couple of months before his death when Clarence got a brasilian/cedar dreadnought from Mark Whitebook. That guitar was one of the last guitars Mark built.

During the those years I also was going to college, worked at Roy''s couple of nights a week and worked at Ace Music in Sanat Monica Cal on friday nights & saturdays. I ahd talked the owners into carrying Roy's guitars along with Miquel Companie of Miami, Stu Mosman, Gallagher and Ren Fergson in addition to the big guys Martin, Gibson and Guild.

In 1973 I started importing Dan Armdtring Guitars and Amps from London, also Hiwatt amps from the UK also working as sales rep for many MI & pro audio companies for many decades I and my friend Dan Armstrong developed an amplifier for Fender and a couple of stratocaster designs for them.
My firm also represented Godin and Seagull guitars in California. One of my dealers Ace Music was looking for something to compete with the Kramer Danny Ferrington thin line acoustic electric that Danny had developed for Kramer (looked like a telecaster with a Jackson style peghead). Hank< , Lloyd Baggs and I co developed a thin line acoustic electric guitar with a chambererd body, bolt on neck. Lloyd developed a new EQ system & pickup for Godin Guitars. A very unique bracing system developed, just one of my Dan Armstrong London guitars as the profile for the neck shape and I designed the peghead so that Godin wouldn't get themselves sued by Fender. I came up with the name acousticaster. Forward to 1992 and Godin screwed all of us, no more royalties and they let my rep firm go as they were putting on factory rep forces.

Over the years Godin changed the design and not for the better. So I am driving home from San Francisco and it 's a long 400 mile drive, So dialed up roy on my mobile phone tat the then rate of $1.25/ minute We talked for almost two hours. discussing the idea of revamping the Acousticaster to what it should have been . the result of that was the CB Alyn Rosebud which was premiered at the 1992 NAMM winter show.
http://cbalynguitars.com From 1992 until 1999 there were over 200 of them sold

I quit the MI/Pro Audio industry in the summer of 1999 and moved to semi retire in Key West, Fl I did continue to build Rosebuds myself 3-4 a year.

In early part of the 2001 I got a call from Roy Noble. Clarence's Noble guitar had disappeared A few years earlier Clarence's wife has loaned the Noble guitar to a friend and school teacher. the school teacher left town with the guitars. He sold it to a guy in Kentucky. That same man called rOy about getting it repaired. Roy was aware that the guitar was missing, Roy gave e Harry's number and the number for Michelle, Clarence daughter.

I called Michelle and told her I would try and recover the guitar. I called and spoke to Harry on many occasions and he was obstinate and kept saying he didn't care he bought it wasn't going to return to the rightful owners. Tuns out a year or so later , Harry sold the guitar to a wealthy Japanese guitar collector for upwards of $40,000. A decade plus passes and I get in touch Michelle again thru Facebook. she remember who I am. I tell her about the Rosebud, she had heard of them nd some of her friends in Nashville. I call her at home, we talk for many hours about her life, mine, her fathers' influence on me and I tell her that I am also building traditional guitars. I tell her that I had had a hand in building her father's two Noble guitars, I have all the dimensional specs of almost every guitars that when thr shop in those years I hung out there I knew the the agreement between CF Martin & Michelle for of Clarence's Noble #0069. without hesitation she said yes. Agreements and royalties were agreed to and signed. Production on the firsts tree have begun.

Three piece Brasilian rosewood body, old growth Sitka top from the 1960's, 25.25" scale, unbound, no inlay Gaboon ebony fingerboard, herringbone single ring rosette, maple binding, b/w/b wood purfing, Grover Rotomatic Tuners Only Roy is that there is an adjustable LMI truss rod instead of the 1/2'X 14" industrial stell truss rod as was used by Noble until 1991. I broke twi fingers in my right hand a month or so ago, having surgery the end of the months and two week later I and my helper can complete the Instrument https://www.facebook.com/CBAlynGuitarwork/