Pete Askew
Admin
I'm am sure that @Rob MacKillop will be interested. Oh, and welcome to RPF, Muuray.
My Next Guitar
- Thread starter Rob MacKillop
- Start date
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
If I think about counting guitars, I think I could count them on one hand...except when I start thinking about partial guitars. Parts probably don't count for counting.
But if I think about counting cameras...impossible. I don't even know where they all are.
I used to have a vague idea which cameras I have more than one of.
I don't like to think about it.
Thank you for the welcome.
But if I think about counting cameras...impossible. I don't even know where they all are.
I used to have a vague idea which cameras I have more than one of.
I don't like to think about it.
Thank you for the welcome.
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
Uh-oh...this is one of those forums with trophies, but at least it does it's own accounting.
I forgot, in my last post, there is also the associated topic of 'how many lenses? ...also complicated by the difficulties with fractions.
I just noticed Rob's post was in 2015. I...
I forgot, in my last post, there is also the associated topic of 'how many lenses? ...also complicated by the difficulties with fractions.
I just noticed Rob's post was in 2015. I...
Brian Moore
Moderator
The recent influx of new members responding to some very old posts has provided us to see these old posts again and in a couple of cases I've seen responses that I had missed first time around. (eg,..Pete's wonderful posing of the Adult Fungas Gnat portrait.) So it's all good!
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
Maybe it has a longer history, but I found (working backwards), several references to guitars called 'After Legnani'. C.F. Martin apprenticed with Johann Georg Stauffer in Vienna. Both of them made guitars with the fingerboard tapering at the sound hole. Not all 'After Legnani' or 'Legnani Model' instruments have the fingerboard taper at the soundhole.
Here is a modern-built mid-late 19th c. style Legnani
I read there were two Legnani's a few decades apart. One was a guitarist, well-enough known to undoubtedly have been a guitarist, but not known to have been a luthier. The other was a violin-maker, with no known signed guitars. I have lost track of where I found these 'certain uncertainties', but there appears to be uncertainty about who actually built the Legnani guitar referred to in later builds as 'After Legnani'.
I don't remember if the Stauffer build or the Martin build had the fingerboard floating above the guitar top. My no-name student guitar has it firmly glued right to the top. Stauffer, IIRC, made an innovative adjustable neck long before Taylor, so that may have been one reason for the floating fingerboard.
Some guitars with that tapered fingerboard had an asymmetrical headstock that I believe must have been inspiration for both Leo Fender's Strat and Merle Travis' sketch handed Paul Bigsby as a 'design' for a custom guitar. But some Americans seem to have naively declared both of these modern guitar designs to be spontaneously inspired. If you look at Balkan domra and tambura/tamburitzas there are scrolled headstocks with the asymmetrical sideways scroll. I read somewhere Leo Fender had a childhood friend who was from one of the Yugoslavian regions where this style instrument was common. Hmmm...did he see one of those folk instruments?
But most European-originated string instruments have older heritage dating back many more centuries to Persia and nearby.
I lost interest at that point. But I learned that the German musical instrument industry in and around Markneukirchen seems to have inspired the German camera industry...subcontractor companies made components they were good at, and another put together the final product. Many of the components had no names. That's not true of German complete cameras or shutters, just the non-machinery components. Different trade unions/guilds?
One of the most interesting (to me) discontinuous continuities (or continuous discontinuities?) in string instruments is the heritage connecting Appalachian Hammered Dulcimers with the Hungarian Cimbalom ('invented' in 1874, but associated with the older psaltery and kannun/qanun. http://www.cimbalom.ca/cimbalom_history.aspx
Here is a modern-built mid-late 19th c. style Legnani
I read there were two Legnani's a few decades apart. One was a guitarist, well-enough known to undoubtedly have been a guitarist, but not known to have been a luthier. The other was a violin-maker, with no known signed guitars. I have lost track of where I found these 'certain uncertainties', but there appears to be uncertainty about who actually built the Legnani guitar referred to in later builds as 'After Legnani'.
I don't remember if the Stauffer build or the Martin build had the fingerboard floating above the guitar top. My no-name student guitar has it firmly glued right to the top. Stauffer, IIRC, made an innovative adjustable neck long before Taylor, so that may have been one reason for the floating fingerboard.
Some guitars with that tapered fingerboard had an asymmetrical headstock that I believe must have been inspiration for both Leo Fender's Strat and Merle Travis' sketch handed Paul Bigsby as a 'design' for a custom guitar. But some Americans seem to have naively declared both of these modern guitar designs to be spontaneously inspired. If you look at Balkan domra and tambura/tamburitzas there are scrolled headstocks with the asymmetrical sideways scroll. I read somewhere Leo Fender had a childhood friend who was from one of the Yugoslavian regions where this style instrument was common. Hmmm...did he see one of those folk instruments?
But most European-originated string instruments have older heritage dating back many more centuries to Persia and nearby.
I lost interest at that point. But I learned that the German musical instrument industry in and around Markneukirchen seems to have inspired the German camera industry...subcontractor companies made components they were good at, and another put together the final product. Many of the components had no names. That's not true of German complete cameras or shutters, just the non-machinery components. Different trade unions/guilds?
One of the most interesting (to me) discontinuous continuities (or continuous discontinuities?) in string instruments is the heritage connecting Appalachian Hammered Dulcimers with the Hungarian Cimbalom ('invented' in 1874, but associated with the older psaltery and kannun/qanun. http://www.cimbalom.ca/cimbalom_history.aspx
Pete Askew
Admin
Interesting link through to camera manufacture there, Murray. I know nothing about the history of guitar making, but I'm sure that @Rob MacKillop does - where is he when you want him?
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
He tired of awaiting responses to a 2015 post?
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
It is surely the same Rob McKillop I read references to the other day, reading about 'Charlie Christian pickups' from the 1930's and modern renditions of them.
Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Guilty as charged! Do you play?
Edit: Sorry, I didn't see th previous posts.
Edit: Sorry, I didn't see th previous posts.
Ivar Dahl-Larsen
Well-Known Member
I like the colours and it's shapeA ten-string classical by Michael Gee. I'll have to wait a year for it....wich will give me time to save up. Photo by Michael Gee.
Ivar Dahl-Larsen
Well-Known Member
Very, very good. Really liked this.
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
Guitars that take pictures? (Close but not quite...)
Coming commission guitar(s) for someone's birthday. I cannot find the original listing on the Comins website, possibly because only a small number of Comins 'Aperture' models were built.
Bill Comins utilized an iris/diaphragm/aperture mechanism to allow the sound hole opening area to be adjustable.
Interestingly, he chased down patent ownership to pay a licensing or royalty (or whatever) for the use of the. I was surprised it was still due.
Here is a photo of a Comins Aperture guitar. I don't know how long the link will be valid, but with a little digging, something usually appears...I think I also saw an online magazine article that discussed it a bit more, perhaps resulting from an interview with the luthier.
There is a dead link later in this article under 'for more info', but this does explain most of it with (at this time) 15 photos, including the iris adjusted to...uh, various f-holes stops...?
As with many DIY iris projects, a shutter is not easily fit.
Ok, I'm really stretching the camera illusion a bit too far.
I have a couple of iris mechanisms that open up to nearly 76 mm/3" (inches, not seconds...no shutter included), that I bought from Surplus Shed in Pennsylvania. Comins is near Philadelphia, PA. I was born (or hatched, I don't remember,) <50 km from there.
Some kind of connection implied...
Coming commission guitar(s) for someone's birthday. I cannot find the original listing on the Comins website, possibly because only a small number of Comins 'Aperture' models were built.
Bill Comins utilized an iris/diaphragm/aperture mechanism to allow the sound hole opening area to be adjustable.
Interestingly, he chased down patent ownership to pay a licensing or royalty (or whatever) for the use of the. I was surprised it was still due.
Here is a photo of a Comins Aperture guitar. I don't know how long the link will be valid, but with a little digging, something usually appears...I think I also saw an online magazine article that discussed it a bit more, perhaps resulting from an interview with the luthier.
Comins Aperture
Bill Comins has been making archtops for quite a while, and is legendary in this regard. While he is famous for his traditional archtops, he is also making som
www.modernmojoguitars.com
There is a dead link later in this article under 'for more info', but this does explain most of it with (at this time) 15 photos, including the iris adjusted to...uh, various f-holes stops...?
As with many DIY iris projects, a shutter is not easily fit.
Ok, I'm really stretching the camera illusion a bit too far.
I have a couple of iris mechanisms that open up to nearly 76 mm/3" (inches, not seconds...no shutter included), that I bought from Surplus Shed in Pennsylvania. Comins is near Philadelphia, PA. I was born (or hatched, I don't remember,) <50 km from there.
Some kind of connection implied...
Gary R. Smith
Well-Known Member
Rob, did you ever get that 10 string?
Once upon a time I had 19 but these days I'm down to 3 guitars, 3 mandolins, 1 mandola and 1 bouzouki and 2 amplifiers.
One of the mandolins is over 100 years old and has been "in the family" for 60 or 70 years and I don't know what to do with it (as in: which of my young, unplaying kin do I ask to take it). The mandola is also pretty old (Gibson circa 1920 or so). I'd like to figure out what to do with all this stuff so when the time comes my wife doesn't have to.
Once upon a time I had 19 but these days I'm down to 3 guitars, 3 mandolins, 1 mandola and 1 bouzouki and 2 amplifiers.
One of the mandolins is over 100 years old and has been "in the family" for 60 or 70 years and I don't know what to do with it (as in: which of my young, unplaying kin do I ask to take it). The mandola is also pretty old (Gibson circa 1920 or so). I'd like to figure out what to do with all this stuff so when the time comes my wife doesn't have to.
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
The 1920 mandola may have two 'resume' qualities that could mean substantial monetary value. 1) if it's a Lloyd Loar Florentine design and 2) also credit to LL, may have tap-tuned wood components from the days when A was not 440 Hz (428?) before Gibson got tired of this laborious practice & just wanted to replicate dimensionally.
Not sure if I read it in the Roger Siminoff Tap Tuning book or elsewhere, but the 428-Hz A tap tuned mandolins are said to have a darker tone the A440-era instruments don't have. Loar-era F-style mandolins have fetched insane prices at auction.
Or it's all hogwash. But I think there being some science behind the story makes it more rational than legend.
Murray Leshner
Not sure if I read it in the Roger Siminoff Tap Tuning book or elsewhere, but the 428-Hz A tap tuned mandolins are said to have a darker tone the A440-era instruments don't have. Loar-era F-style mandolins have fetched insane prices at auction.
Or it's all hogwash. But I think there being some science behind the story makes it more rational than legend.
Murray Leshner
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
Gary-
Back up to Ivar's response a few posts ago...I think he linked to a video of Rob with the 10-stringer.
Murray
Back up to Ivar's response a few posts ago...I think he linked to a video of Rob with the 10-stringer.
Murray
Gary R. Smith
Well-Known Member
The mandola is an A-style. I doubt it was even near Lloyd's hands.
Last edited:
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
)Then Orville was probably happy.
Gibson vs. Loar
Selmer vs. Maccaferri
Factory relationships with manufacturing not liking the designer's aim for perfection (at other costs).
Not sure who was right but I lean toward the instrument designers.
But Maccaferri also became infatuated with molded plastic (guitars, ukuleles, clothespins).
Gary R. Smith
Well-Known Member
Django seemed to like his Maccaferri.
Gary R. Smith
Well-Known Member
For some reason I just thought that was a generic 10-string video. Very Nice!
My playing is somewhat different.
Here's me and another guy with our version of the Beatles "Nowhere Man"
Murray Leshner
Well-Known Member
No one seems to have noticed the Comins 'Aperture' literally has a camera diaphragm in the sound hole to allow the sound hole area to be changed like an f-stop, instead of f-holes.Guitars that take pictures? (Close but not quite...)
Coming commission guitar(s) for someone's birthday. I cannot find the original listing on the Comins website, possibly because only a small number of Comins 'Aperture' models were built.
Bill Comins utilized an iris/diaphragm/aperture mechanism to allow the sound hole opening area to be adjustable.
Interestingly, he chased down patent ownership to pay a licensing or royalty (or whatever) for the use of the. I was surprised it was still due.
Here is a photo of a Comins Aperture guitar. I don't know how long the link will be valid, but with a little digging, something usually appears...I think I also saw an online magazine article that discussed it a bit more, perhaps resulting from an interview with the luthier.
Comins Aperture
Bill Comins has been making archtops for quite a while, and is legendary in this regard. While he is famous for his traditional archtops, he is also making somwww.modernmojoguitars.com
There is a dead link later in this article under 'for more info', but this does explain most of it with (at this time) 15 photos, including the iris adjusted to...uh, various f-holes stops...?
As with many DIY iris projects, a shutter is not easily fit.
Ok, I'm really stretching the camera illusion a bit too far.
I have a couple of iris mechanisms that open up to nearly 76 mm/3" (inches, not seconds...no shutter included), that I bought from Surplus Shed in Pennsylvania. Comins is near Philadelphia, PA. I was born (or hatched, I don't remember,) <50 km from there.
Some kind of connection implied...
