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Warning!

This, my first box purchase:

Leads to this.  My first guitar build 'round about January 2011.

Leads to this:

Leads to this today:

Cigar boxes are a gateway.  Certain other side effects such as tattoos (yes, I got my first 2 this year) and quitting your day job (yes, I did that) may also occur.  Please use caution.

End of message.

The following song is in ABC music format and it should be cut-and-pasted into an ABC converter program like the "abcConverter" on Mandolintab.net. Once you submit your ABC file, the converter will produce a quick and dirty image of your musical score which is then displayed on screen. Above the music, in the center of the screen, you should be able to see these three links:

[MIDI music file]  [PDF Sheet Music]  [ABC source]

The first link will allow you to hear your music as played on a midi player, which is great for learning what a new song is supposed to (kind of) sound like. It's great if you are not sure of the timing of the music. The second link converts the ABC source into a .pdf image of your music which you can then save and/or print to yield prettier sheet music. Then, if you want to view the ABC source again, you can click on the third link. However, to edit your ABC source, you best click on your browser's back arrow to take you back to the original text box holding your ABC source.

Well, I like this song, and I hope you do as well. Enjoy:

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

X:1
T:Cripple Creek
C:USA, Traditional
M:4/4
L:1/8
K:D
|: d2 d2 AA F2 | G2 B2 A4 |
w:Girls on Crip-ple Creek 'bout half grown,
w:7 7 4 4 2 3 5 4
w:~
F2 FF E2 DD | A,2 B,B, D2 z2 :|
w:Jump on a man like a dog on a bone.
w:2 2 2 1 0 0 2/0 2/1 2/1 0
w:~
w:Chorus:%
w:~
|: FF F2 EE D2 | FF FF A4 |
w:Go- in' up Crip- ple Creek, Go in' in a run,
w:2 2 2 1 1 0 2 2 2 2 4
w:~
FF F2 EE DB, | A,A, B,B, D z2 :|
w:Go- in' up Crip- ple Creek, to have a lit- tle fun.
w:2 2 2 1 1 0 2/1 2/0 2/0 2/1 2/1 0
w:~

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

Note: These are tabs for a stick dulcimer with at least 2 strings.
For a version with all  notes playable on 1 string, you will need to
transpose upward by 3 notes.

More verses can be found by searching the Internet, but I leave
matching the lyrics with the notes as a learning project for you.

You'll find this version real simple to learn and play,

Dear team

After many failed attemps at fretting I am planning to try again and after some help.

1) What is the best fret wire to use?

2) What's the best scale length to use?

3) What is any string height compensation required against scale length?

4) Could I be using incorrect strings and will that make a huge difference?

What is the trick to making these work and play well?

Your help is greatly appreciated.

Mr Bug

(This is clever on an old banjo I have for just an interesting photo, note brass tube to typical 6 string tuners one not used, I kept my kids tooth to make a banjo nut from shhhh dont tell the tooth fairy)

Here are some tips that I do

1) Pick a song and learn it, doesn't need to be difficult

2) Personalise it by slight changes or the way you do the melody

3) Negative space is just as important as positive space, stops, rhythms, breaks etc....ie not one big thrash of mush

4) Pace the song speed matters, generally faster drives the song slower gives more moody feel

5) Now play it slightly more relaxed than you usually do, but put real feeling into your voice highs and lows

Blues was a feeling so put your mind set into that emotion before you sing. If you feel sad and sing it it will come across.

6) Sing to the notes of the guitar most old blues singers sing to the actual notes they play, it helps you keep in tune with your singing and sounds very Delta blues.

7) Go for it with your singing and don't hold back, don't worry how it sounds as you develop you can adjust it, someone who goes for it comes across as trying even if you arn't that great at singing and eventually it comes.

8) listen to the recordings and play them back until you like the version you do.

9) listen to the songs you like and break them down into tiny pieces, what is the bass doing, the rhythm, the notes players, the notes sang and try and replicate this.

10) Feel the blues, learn your way learn a blues scale you are familiar with so you can jam in it, take your riffs and join them to make songs. See Uncle Johns blues song writing blog for lyric writting and away you go.

The old blues players were desperate to get out of the cotton fields and that was their driving force to get good.

i.e Try harder and don't hold back!! ... to fail is to learn a bit more

Good luck and May the blues force be with you 

Harmonica Playing:

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/instant-naked-raw-brutal-blues-harmonica-your-first-lesson

Uncle Johns Blues song Writing Blog:

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/profiles/blogs/songwriting-recipe-for-a-simple-blues-song

String expression

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTHQWywjMeE

String Expression

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_x2stMysdY

Shoving it all together, sing to your CBG:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpSM2sovbZg

"I made up a lot of the songs I sing. It's like you hear a record or something or other. Well, you pick out some words out of that record that you like. You sing that and add something else onto it. It's just like if you're going to pray, and mean it, things will be in your mind. As fast as you get one word out, something else will come in there. Songs should tell the truth... When I play-- if you pay attention, what I sing the guitar sings, too. And what the guitar say, I say."

Mississippi Fred Mc Dowell 

"There's no way in the world I can feel the same blues the way I used to. When I play in Chicago, I'm playing up-to-date, not the blues I was born with. People should hear the pure blues - the blues we used to have when we had no money.

"The blues tells a story. Every line of the blues has a meaning".

John Lee Hooker

"The term Blues may have come from the term "blue devils", meaning melancholy and sadness; depressed mood."

(George Colmans one-act farce Blue Devils (1798))

If you have any other tips or comments  drop them below:"

I hope this helps you feel and play your blues...

This may be old news to some of you, but I was told something by a Cigar shop owner that surprised me.  His shop almost always has 50 -100 empty boxes available but most are on the small size. A little small for a CBG but ok for amp, speaker, etc. I picked out 3 boxes and commented on not seeing some of the big names in the pile. He told me the companies with the nicer, larger boxes were buying them back from the stores or giving the store credit for them.  I can see this having quite an effect on availability to people like me.  Comments ?

This guitar has a plywood neck, IPE fretboard, oak headstock and bridge.

Finished it with shellac.

it has no decorative elements, but I might add some later:

And this is how it sounds (before the final intonation):

Cheers

Hi

I recently bought a new harp and its a G minor as I have heard minor scale can sound great

It says its in the second position tuning.

Can anyone advise me how that works and what chords or notes I can play to it on my CBG

as I normally play in open D,AEA or G..

Does anyone know what are the minor chords for 3 and 4 string CBG?

Your help is appreciated

Mr Bug

All of a sudden the article "P-Bass Stomp Box" had appeared most popular on my "DIY Guitar" website.

Many questions in comments.

So I decided to publish the most simple and clear wiring plan which I used for myself.

Here you go: Cigar Box Stomp Box Wiring

I was in the need of having some kind of jig not only where I could do some fret work, but that I could also use to do other operations, or just lay down the guitars.  The inspiration is from Stewart-MacDonald fretting jig. But since its price is way too much for those who do this as a hobby I decided to do a version of my own, but in the low cost style using 3D printed parts!

Scrolling down are the some photos of the first prototype. I need to redesign some of the components so that the printed parts come out stronger.  I estimating that the final version will cost around 50€ if you own a 3d printer, and if you do not them you should be able to order the plastic parts and still be bellow the 60€.

The big aluminium extrusion in the middle really should be stiffer, but this was what I had. All extrusions are 20x20mm. You could go for a 20x40 for the middle (or stronger).

What else could I add to this jig to increase its functionality or range of operations one could do on it?

A Visit to Matty Baratto's Guitar Shop

Hollywood's Cigar Box Guitar Builder to the Stars

by Shane Speal

When Paul McCartney stepped on stage with a cigar box guitar in 2012, the news went around Cigar Box Nation like wildfire.  Many people recognized the instrument as one similar to the cigar box guitars seen in the hands of Johnny Depp, Steven Tyler, Dave Grohl and other rock stars...but they didn't know anything about the builder, Matty Baratto.

Matty is a professional luthier who has worked with some of the biggest names in the business.  He's toured as a guitar tech for KISS, Sugar Ray and many others and he has built custom guitars for many others.  Matty has also buillt cigar box guitars under the brand name, "CigFiddles" for the past twenty years.

Two months ago, Ben "C. B. Gitty" Baker and I visited his shop in North Hollywood, CA on a Friday afternoon.  It was over nine years since I had last seen Matty and the visit was a great way to catch up.

"I have to apologize in advance," Matty said as we walked in.  "I'm under a deadline to get this pink plexiglass guitar (pictured: right) to Pharrell Williams' guitarist by Monday.  They're going on tour."

"Wait...nevermind," he said.  "I'll work on it later.  It's good to see you, Shane!  Let's eat lunch and catch up."  And with that, he abandoned his pressing project to spend some time with Ben and myself.

Matty Baratto is one of those guys who becomes your best friend the first time you meet him.  Unassuming, friendly and excitable like a teenager, his personality draws you in.  You'd never expect a guy like this to be a guitar maker to the stars.  In fact, he becomes almost apologetic when he starts name-dropping various famous customers. 

The instrument above is a double neck CigFiddle custom built for Johnny Depp.  It features Baratto's signature tenor-scale necks (19" scale) in both single and double coursed versions.  This is one of several CigFiddles purchased by Depp.  In fact, Johnny Depp has become an evangelist of the CigFiddle, giving them as gifts to many famous people including the one played by Paul McCartney!

(Above) Three examples of Matty's earliest CigFiddles.  The middle guitar is the first one he built back in 1994.

(Right) In order to streamline the building process, Matty created various jigs for his CigFiddles.   The one pictured to the left is for his resonator version, as used by Paul McCartney.  In order to use these jigs, Matty searches for one particular cigar box that is used on most of his builds.

Matty was the first person I know of that used paint can lids as his resonator material, cutting the box hole big enough for the lid to fit snugly inside.  He has since engineered a custom "spider bridge" system that fits inside the can lid.  He has the bridges created on a local wet-cut CNC machine.

(Left) CigFiddle necks have been roughed out and the necks are shaped by a router.  Baratto will then shape the necks more, add frets and lastly, add his name logo to the headstock.

The shorter tenor-sized necks are a big draw for many pro guitarists because the CigFiddle falls in the sonic spectrum between a guitar and mandolin.  Some players tune them like a standard tenor while others opt to use open tunings.

To hear the CigFiddles in action, check out the album "Spark" by Alain Johannes (guitarist for Queens of the Stone Age).  The entire album features various CigFiddles and is an art rock masterpiece.   

Want to see more? More Pics From My Visit to Matty Baratto's Guitar Shop

Baratto Guitars: www.barattoguitars.com

Indian Classical Music is all about ragas. A raga portrays a mood, a sentiment, expressed through a microtonal scale. There are a number of ragas, each with its own mood and its own corresponding microtonal scale that is based on the natural harmonic series - the natural law of vibrations.

Today, Indian Classical music is influenced by a foreign tonal system that is not based on the natural harmonic series. This is the Western tonal system that has had a big influence on Indian Classical music. Many Indian Classical musicians, nowadays, make use of Western instruments such as guitar and drums.

Most Western audiences find Indian Classical music to be quite exotic. Two major reasons are the differences between the two traditions in tuning and scales.

The subtle differences

Let's straightaway delve into the differences between these two vast genres of music to get a better idea:

• Indian Classical Music (ICM) is primarily homophonic, which means that it focuses on creating melodies using a sequence of notes, whereas Western Classical Music (WCM) is to an extent polyphonic, which means multiple notes are played/sung together, where the counterpoint, harmony, and texture created using multiple voices is very important.

• WCM is composed, whereas ICM is improvised. WCM compositions are formally written using Staff Notation, and performers usually follow that. But in the case of ICM, the Teacher-Student tradition of learning leads to each performance being an improvisation.

• ICM uses "Taal", where Taal is a cycle of beats that is centered on "Sam" that repeats itself. In the case of WCM, there aren't any complex beat cycles.

• WCM is modal and so has a chord for each note of the scale. On the contrary, ICM is tonal and, hence, is based on a single scale (a single drone, chord, and key).

Fusion all the way

But then again fusion is a growing concept in India. So, their differences and some similarities make fusion music even more interesting and challenging. If we take a deeper look, we will actually find a number of similarities. Today, "guitar" has acquired prime position and popularity in Indian Classical Music with Indian Ragas being played on guitar.

There are two types of Guitars that is used for fusion in India: Spanish guitar and Hawaiian guitar.A wide variety and mix of instruments ranging from Guitar, Drums, and Saxophone to Sitar, Tabla, and Flute are used for fusion music/concerts.

My band, known as Kaivalyaa, is also a fusion band, where we fuse various western genres with Indian Classical music. The Western and Indian instruments we use include Guitar, Drums, Keyboards, Mouth Organ, Bass Guitar, Harmonium, Flute, Sarod, Tabla, and a number of percussion instruments. Some of the big names in the Indian fusion scenario are Indian Ocean, Avial, Advaita, Raghu Dixit Project, Mother Jane, Tabla Beat Science, and Bandish Fusion. With varied influences, experiments, scales, tones, and sounds, fusion is the next big thing. So, if you want to know more about the Indian Classical scales/Ragas, you are at the right place. 

http://www.guitar-learning.com

"Don't quit yer day-job" is advice often heard.  Well I've done it.  Again.

Last time I was 24 and fed up with being an Engineer.  I wanted to move away from my home area and thankfully my wife was up for it.  We moved to Golden, Colorado on our 3rd wedding anniversary.

This time, I'm 41 and the choice and process were tremendously more complicated by all the things that come along with time.  Inertia, kids, obligations, etc.  So it was a very painful and difficult process for the last 5 months.  I've sort of been absent from here during that time.

I was President of a small and very successful company that I started in 2006.  After 8 years of very intense efforts I decided it was time for a change.  The demands of the business had changed and other circumstances meant this was the time to spring off to something else.

This all comes back to CBGs because I went through some of the most troubling times in the last 5 months.  I've faced off extremely difficult challenges including cancer when I was 29 with greater ease.  I'm a stoic and logical person, but I had what were probably genuine anxiety issues and strong psychosomatic responses at certain points recently.  Last week, I had an evening when I couldn't breathe.

I'm not the type to seek medication or self-medicate with alcohol to cope, but I wasn't sure what to do.  And then I decided to pick up my Rustocaster 1931 license plate guitar.  And all was OK.

So yes, I have quit my day-job and yes, music will be part of it.  I'll spend the next year playing more and likely will build a few special instruments for sale.   Here are a couple things I'm working on now.

8-string Octave Mandolin

I'm almost done with this one.  My choice to use my signature twisted head stock is causing me headaches for stringing it up since I think there will be too much side-loading on my zero bone design nut.  I have some ideas for solving this, but it is slowing me down.

Electric Upright Bass

My 9 year-old daughter and I are making a 1/4 size electric upright.  Maple neck and purple heart finger board with 4" radius.  We're calling this one the Dragon Mace since the hand-carved sections remind me of dragon scales.

I'm very grateful to be featured in the Charlotte Observer's "Arts Alive" section for my video "Just Like a Dog" from my new album License Plate Sessions. To watch the video and read the article go here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2014/08/04/5080735/band-video-sincerely-iriss-license.html#.U-Dg1PldXKA

Special thanks to Courtney Devores for writing the article and Jay Patton for building the guitar and producing the album.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/license-plate-sessions-ep/id889936804

Last week Saturday I have had the privilege to meet Seasick Steve backstage at an enourmous festival called "Zwarte Cross : here in Holland. It is a 4 days festival full of motor cross, live bands on diverse stages and on Saturday on mainstage: SEASICK STEVE!! for the website go to www.zwartecross.nl

What has happened:
A dutch newspaper had put out a contest 'Who builds a playable guitar for Seasick Steve before Zwarte Cross festival'.

A good friend of mine made me aware of this contest and of course I immediately started to build with the result that from the 4 entries, mine was choosen as the winner! The prize was a free entrace to the festival and if possible, a handover of the guitar to Seasick Steve. With some greta help of some people on this forum, Steve's management was also aware of the guitar contest and we could meet Steve and Dan ( I once had met both before, two years a go, so it was great to meet again!)

Steve really liked my guitar and was very enthousiastic about the design of it. Here is the You Tube with an explanation why and how I came to this design:

http://youtu.be/BI8TlMzXQ7w

As you can see it consist of a cigarbox, a old hubcap, a beercan, a neck of mahony, a humbucker pick up and all the parts in and on it are "barnfinds", so all are used parts.

Steven really liked the rotor arm that I had also put on it as a symbol for the possibility to play High Voltage Rock with this guitar . He played a couple of songs on the thing and liked the guitar so much that he wantred me to keep it. He signed it for me with, for me very treasured texts like 'Henri this is one amazing invention', 'Seasick was here' etc. The meet and greet with Steve and Dan was amazing. I also had my drummer Gerco with me and a photografer that took a lot of pictures of the festival itself and of us with Steve and Dan.

You can find the images (also about Steve and Dan playing their gig) here (beware of the fact that it is a lot of images):


https://www.flickr.com/photos/62504229@ ... 953320031/


As you can imagine it was an amazing experience and this guitar will never be sold as it means a lot to me with all the texts on it. It is posted on many different forums and shown in many diffrent Dutch news papers, so it is becoming a famous guitar too.

Of course I will once and a while use it on stage and play some tribute to the great man himself!!

I just made my first Cigar Box Guitar, first I used a stem from an existing Sanxian, added biscuit box, then, I enlarged the stem in width and made a 6 string guitar once I found out how to make the pegs.  So here we are!  Thank you for the wonderful exciting site on Cigar Box Guitar.  Now, I will learn to play my guitars.  :)  Will add piezo amplifier later.  
Here is the link to my CBG http://swannbb.blogspot.tw/2014/08/swannjies-new-work-3-string-sanxian-6.html

Hey everyone, I'll be heading to the Appalachian String Band Festival (Clifftop, WV) soon and gone for a week. This American roots music festival leans heavily toward traditional fiddle and banjo tunes but there are also groups of blues, cajun and New Orleans brass band folks there as well - all acoustic music. One thing I love about this festival is that the overwhelming majority of the 3,000 + people who attend play music at various levels. There are a few who just come to listen but it's mostly musicians. It's a humbling/uplifting experience for me since many of the guys and ladies play circles around me but are still willing to jam with the likes of me! I'm hoping to talk a group of folks into playing cigar box, cookie tin, and other homemade instruments on stage for what I believe will be a first there! I usually enter the banjo contest. They give prizes for the top five places as determined by the judges. I always tie for 6th place along with about 50 other banjo players! Anyway I'll be happily away from computers for about a week and will report back upon my return/recuperation!

Yup, that's a CB Fiddle on stage there last year.