I'm not sure how much information there is out there or here about "real" cigar box guitars. What we do is as real as anything, of course, but does anyone have an idea about how one of this gits would have been build back in, say, the early 1900s on some farm in the deep south? Magnetic pick ups, fancy tropical hardwoods, factory tails and tuning machines, etc are wonderful ways to explore this form of folk instruments, but what would one of these things have been like historically? Wire or gut strings? Frets or no frets? Hide glue or no glue? Square nails or no nails?
Thanks in advance for any input.
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Hmmmmmm...... I find in interesting that the oldest known recording of a CBG isn't a blues song. It's a song about beans. In the same comedy styling as 'Oh Susana' and 'Camp Town Races'. The same lyrical style as a lot of songs from the late 1800's to the early 1900's. I think it's safe to say people who played guitars of any kind where like people today. Interested in playing what ever is popular.
http://www.cigarboxnation.com/photo/albums/the-cigar-box-guitar-museum
Then, get a copy of Bill Jehle's Book, One Man's Trash. Here's a Flickr link to his site, with dozens of photos, so you can judge primitivity for yourself:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/tedcrocker/sets/72157600365357368/
And here's his site itself:
http://www.bellyjellymusic.com/cigar-box-guitar-museum.html
Pick has already given you John McNair's Red Dog Guitars site.
Ron, this is exactly what I was interested in. Thanks so much.
cigar / kleanx / fruit box , a broom stick and the wire from the broom neck as string .
was the basics of a cbg / diddly bow . frets were rare , fancy was a waste of time .
wider sticks , carved necks, and more strings were options too.
later add ons (mostly due to invention and availability times, ) such as pickups and mags were evolutions to the acoustic box .. but most relied on the natural resonation of the box .
john mcnair , of reddog guitars , has a flare for posting the historic side of cbgs .
http://www.reddogguitars.com/BluesHistory/HistoryPage.html
Thanks for the post.
https://youtu.be/TsgUdEOCwPM
Hey Dane, I'm not sure if this is the vid wayfinder was talking about. It's one I posted a couple of years ago. Most of these tools and techniques were used hundreds of years ago for furniture making and most likely for homemade instruments as well.
Nice demo, Jim. I am more than familiar with these techniques. I used to make a lot of wooden archery bows, and still do once in a while. The shaving horse is a great tool.
I was actually more interested in how crude or finished historic CBGs would have been. I can of course use very old tools (spoke shaves, draw knives, brace and bits and so on) to build one. I wonder how much someone back 100 years ago would have cared about fit and finish, or if they were on the crude side (to our eyes), and if any of the old instruments were fretted, stuff like that.
Mostly, I am interested in trying to get the most old-time sound out of my instruments, and the closer I can get to what a guy on a farm in Georgia would have crafted, the better.
Thanks Dane. Sorry if I was talking about stuff you may know a lot more about than me! Never made an archery bow but would like to have a try at it. Anyway it's good to know there's another drawknife, shaving horse guy out there. I suspect there would have been a wide range from very crude to nicely finshed homemade instruments even on Georgia farms. Looking at homemade furniture from that era shows what went from strictly utilitarian to some very beautifully finished pieces.
No worries, since you don't know my background. If you interested in bows and other nifty things, here is a link to a treasure trove of info. http://paleoplanet69529.yuku.com/directory#.VTkCDvldXec
Lots of primitive bows and arrows, atlatls, etc, but more importantly, a forum for some the most talented folks around the world who are into ancient skills, including stone tools. So much can be incorporated into our own explorations. Some skills are very much used by luthiers, including hide glue for instance.
I agree, some of the folk art, furniture, etc we have inherited shows a high level of sophistication. I visited a Shaker community (now a museum) in Pittsfield, and the things the Shakers were building using only hand tools just blows my mind.
Thanks for the link Dane. So many old skills that, except for a few talented folks, would be lost! It's amazing to look at ancient buildings, art, and things as "simple" as stone points and atlatls and realize that our ancestors were highly skilled craftsmen and had to be to survive. The idea that some of these things must have come from alien visitors giving us knowledge comes, I think, from the fact that we don't know how to do so many of the things that our ancestors were doing.
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