Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Shawn on January 31, 2017 at 1:37pm

Look up cigar box guitar metal no rules on YouTube or Filthy Lucri Handmade or AC/DC Thunderstruck on 3 string CBG. There are others out there.

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Permalink Reply by Cause the Blue rat on January 31, 2017 at 2:00pm

I've always argued that cbg weren't made for the blues. They were made for the music of the day. The very first recording of a cbg is a song called 'Beans'. Nothing to do with the blues. I've also heard interviews. People talking about their grandparents playing country and gospel music on home made instruments. Cigar box guitars are now and have always been guitars. They are made to play what ever music you like. 

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Permalink Reply by Jim Morris on January 31, 2017 at 3:26pm

Yup, I second that opinion Cause. I play very few blues tunes on my CB instruments and lean more to folk, pop, and traditional Appalachian music. Looking back at my vids of the last few months I've got stuff like This Masquerade, Tears of a Clown, Rainy Night In Georgia, Hallelujah, Durang's Hornpipe and a few blues tunes here and there. Jose, if you look a little deeper you'll find every style from classical to Django Reinhardt, and much much more all played on CB instruments.

Here's one of my favorite guys on CBN who plays a wide variety of styles.

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/cancona-cigar-box-cover

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Permalink Reply by turtlehead on January 31, 2017 at 5:06pm

I'll third that opinion and was going to link Cpt. Nemoff too.  CBGs are tailor made for the blues, but I'm no bluesman so I play whatever I'm into at the time.  The real trick is to sound like yourself...

  

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Permalink Reply by Janis Wilson Hughes on February 1, 2017 at 10:40am

YOWZER! Jim, I'm glad you posted that link to Captain Nemoff. That was awesome!

And I like it that you step out with different styles in your videos. Makes me not feel like such an outsider not playing the blues myself. 

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Permalink Reply by Moritz Voegeli on February 1, 2017 at 8:40pm

Jim, you mentioned traditional Appalachian music: as lots of people are asking for chord books and tabs, do you have suggestions about where to find and how to use material thought for DAD tuned dulcimer playing for cigar box guitars? Some valuable links?

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Permalink Reply by Jim Morris on February 2, 2017 at 11:26am

I've thought about that before Moritz because it seems like a good idea but there are a couple of hurdles. The first is that most fretted CBG's use chromatic fretting whereas dulci's are diatonic. This of course means that fret numbers on tabs won't correspond. Fret #2 on dulci gives an f# but you get an e on CBG even if both are tuned Dad. The other problem is that on dulci the strings are "backwards" compared to CBG. With a dulcimer in your lap the high, melody string or strings are closest to the player's body. If you hold a CBG in your lap it's the low string near your belly. This makes tab more confusing than it needs to be. In the last couple of years there have been more tab books and resources here on CBN that are specific to CBG's available.

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Permalink Reply by Moritz Voegeli on February 2, 2017 at 9:14pm

Thanks Jim, I was just thinking about dulcimer tabs as an opportunity to get familiarized with other musical stiles and traditions.

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Permalink Reply by Moritz Voegeli on January 31, 2017 at 7:45pm

If we take into consideration the statement of blues man Rubin Lacy «the blues is not sung for the tune, it's sung for the words mostly: a real blues singer sings a blues for the words» finally there is little blues on CBN: in history purely instrumental blues is marginal, to mention Sylvester Weaver's «Guitar Blues» from 1923 as an example.

 

Termoking brought a bunch of photos from soldiers and war prisoners of World War I to CBN, another important ambient for handmade instruments were lumberjack camps:

 

From Wisconsin: https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2015/07/james-p-leary-and-folksongs-...

 

From World War II: http://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/showthread.php?101928-Finnish-194...: «About the models, I've seen wartime mandolins made of any wood available including cigar boxes. Fiddles have been made of matches glued to each other and [shot down] aircraft aluminium parts were used to almost anything.»

 

Not made for blues, but just for music of any kind...

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Permalink Reply by Ron "Oily" Sprague on February 1, 2017 at 1:52am

I'll octuple or whatever that opinion: you can play any kind of music on a CBG, within the limitations of the number of strings, the tuning, and your talent.

Here's a recent vid of Brett Gardner absolutely ripping some Django Reinhardt-style gypsie guitar on a 3-string CBG at the New Orleans CBG fest recently:

https://youtu.be/OZk6DE4UDdg

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Permalink Reply by Ron "Oily" Sprague on February 1, 2017 at 3:25am

And you want melodic rock? Here's one of (shamelessly self-promoted) mine:

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/oily-s-guitar-lounge-6-take-an-...

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Permalink Reply by Janis Wilson Hughes on February 1, 2017 at 10:34am

I totally agree too! Y'all feel free to throw stones at me, but I don't listen to the blues. I wanna play (and do play) what I like to listen to. I'm learning some blues CBG to play with my friends who play the blues, but it's not my first choice. I appreciate the blues, but I like pop rock. If feels freeing to say that here, even tho I know some of you guys will choke on my taste. :)

And in more shameless self promotion, I just shared this tutorial of Dire Straits "Money for Nothing" on CBG today. 

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