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Notes about “Books.”
Originally, I had only hoped to write books on Lutherie. Over the years, there have been occasions when I put together a photo-essay of a repair or a build. At first, I only presented them on the website as incremental blog-posts. But, later I collated the posts in book-form.
Hopefully, for those and other future works, I will be posting these books here: They will be accessible to anyone who is interested.
Unfortunately, they will come up rather slowly, as this “publishing stuff” is new territory for me.
Building a Five-String Fiddle
This is a photo-essay of the building progress (mostly step-by-step) of a commissioned, five-string, acoustic fiddle. Interestingly, the customer chose Curly, old-growth Koa, with a Sitka spruce belly. Obviously, these are “non-traditional woods, but the fiddle turned out very well.
The Journeys of the Swan (The first of my books on an extensive repair.)
This photo essay chronicles the rebuilding and completion of a cello. Kai Jensen began building it about 1990, but never completed it. He passed away without having completed his only cello. His daughter, Maryanne Jensen-Gowan, commissioned me to complete the instrument.
Old Fiddle Repairs
This will probably become a list of articles or short books on resurrecting old fiddles. Only two for now, but more will come. These will appear on Kindle for their minimum price.
The Bread Bag Fiddle is a short work (3,800 words, 30 photos) chronicling the transformation of a “junk-store special”…a sadly neglected and abused violin, into the daily player of a gigging fiddler.
“Resurrection of Another Dead Fiddle” is even a little shorter, but it includes details of internal structural repairs, as well as replacement of missing rib wood and s full neck-set. The customer had sadly set this one aside and bught a cheap violin on which to practice, but after the repairs, this violin returned to being her daily player. Happy Customer!
