Kodakaster 4 - Sapele Gold

I saw this 35mm bulk film can for sale on eBay a few weeks ago and had the thought that the gold color might be a nice color contrast with Flatpup humbucker that I wanted to try with my next canjo build. So, I went online and bought the gold can (the buy now option), and the hand-wound copper wire humbucker made and sold online by Elmar Zeilhofer in Vienna, Austria.

The film can arrived here first and, since I already had stained and polished the dark red, mohogony-like sapele wood neck from C. B. Gitty, I began assembling my next Kodakaster 3-string electric slide canjo, my fourth attempt since I began building them 6 months ago.

The humbucker arrived here in Asheville from Austria a few days ago and the first thing I did was glue it into place on the top of the film can under where the strings would be strung above it. The glue took about 72 hours to cure and since we have been having thunder showers almost without stop for about three weeks, I figured I'd better give the glue a few extra days to harden because of the unusually high humidity we are experiencing in the Blue Ridge Mountains this summer.

This morning, I wired the pup to the electronics, installed the strings, plugged it in and fired up my newest Kodakaster through my little Fender Rumble 15 bass practice amp. It really sounds great with a more full-frequency spectrum from the humbucker than from the other piezo pickups that I used for two of my first three Kodakasters. It amplifies the slide chords without any hum or feedback and has a very clean, bluesy tone.

And, I think my Kodakaster 4 looks pretty cool, too.

Live and learn, eh? Onward!

Kodakaster Take 3

My third version of the Kodakaster Film Can 3-String Canjo has taken shape. This time I used an oak neck, gold machine/tuners, gold ferules, with gold bolts for the bridge and nut. I've also installed another piezo electric pickup attached inside the can with a guitar cord jack and volume control. I keep thinking that I will become faster at making these but I learn something building each new version and try to make each new model better than the last. So, as my Dad used to say, slow and steady wins the race.

The next Kodakaster I will build (#4) will feature a sapele neck (a beautiful dark-red African hardwood similar to mahogany), gold fixtures and two new elements. Instead of the shiny silver metal 35mm film cans that I recycled from my collection for the first three Kodakasters, I will be using a gold colored, matte finished film can that I purchased on eBay for $1.90 (shipping was $8). In addition, another new variation will be the addition of a guitar-style pickup, called a Flatpup, that I found online that I think will be a perfect addition to the next variant of the Kodakaster.

Hand crafted by Elmar Zeilhofer of Vienna, Austria, these beautiful humbucker pickups are only 4mm thick so, unlike conventional humbuckers which are much thicker and would necessitate being installed through a hole cut into the top of my canjo, Flatpups can be glued to the top of my film can on the outside with the small wires entering the body of the canjo through a small hole underneath it.

As I have found out, there is a perceptive difference in the sound gathering properties between piezo and magnetic guitar pickups. Piezo pickups can sound more harsh in the mid and higher frequencies while magnetic pickups like the Flatpup Humbuckers made by Elmar Zeilhofer generally produce a more aggressive, pleasant, full spectrum sound than a piezo pickup without equalization.

So, now the waiting begins until a small package arrives from Europe with my shiny new humbucker. I can't wait to glue it onto Kodakaster #4, plug it into the closest amplifier and crank 'er up!

The Dymaxion Film Can Combo Amp/Speaker

“Do More with Less” was an admonition from the late, great educator, philosopher, architect, and design scientist/futurist R. Buckminster Fuller who, among his various inventions in the last century, included practical applications of the geodesic dome.

The word Dymaxion, a brand name that Fuller used for several of his inventions, is a portmanteau (a combination of two or more words and their definitions, into one new word) from the words dynamic, maximum, and tension.

This brand name was needed for Fuller's first architectural model of a synergistically designed single family dwelling, later known as the Dymaxion house. He also used the word for many of his other futuristic inventions including the Dymaxion house, the Dymaxion car, and the Dymaxion World Map.

As a very-much lesser inventor myself, and having a need for a inexpensive, simple,  portable, battery-powered combo speaker/amplifier to use with my other “invention”, the 3-string film electric canjo I call the Kodakaster, I decided to try to use another larger film can similar to one I used for the canjo (this one 14 inched in diameter) in the spirit of  the modern mantra, “recycle - reuse”.

My thinking was that I might find some way to turn the empty metal film can to my purposes by applying a so-called tactile transducer inside the can. I had to look no further for such a devise than the wonderful online store, Parts Express. The Dayton Audio QEX19 Quadpod Self-Amplified Sound Exciter fit my purposes perfectly since it is small and relatively inexpensive at $18.90. As the Parts Express site proudly declares, “the QEX19 Self-Amplified Sound Exciter turns virtually any solid object into a speaker by vibrating it at speeds of up to 20,000 cycles per second. Built-in amplifier allows you to put sound virtually anywhere!”

After consulting with a knowledgeable tech expert at Parts Express via email, I also purchased a Behringer PB100 Preamp / Volume Booster Stomp Box ($24.99) to boost the piezo pickup output from my Kodacaster canjo to match regular amplifier input of the Dayton Audio exciter.

My order from Parts Express arrived a few days later in the mail and I assembled my new canjo amp, which only took about 20 minutes since each electronic component was a self-contained module and the film can only needed a small hole to run the exciter’s wire through from the inside.

I inserted batteries into the two components, fired up my newest musical tool and, golly-bob-howdy, the sucker worked. 

Next, I built a short triangular stand from some spare wood sticks and hardware on-hand, plugged the canjo, going through the pre-amp, into the film can combo speaker and began evaluating the intensely funky sound of sliding open chords up and down the strings of my canjo’s neck.

But, I also noticed that the can produced a more pleasing tone if the bottom of it, where I had attached the exciter in the center of the inside, was facing forward toward where an audience would be. The only problem was that the bottom was completely clean without the old film laboratory label that was affixed to the top.

Then, it hit me. 

I had a decal/sticker that I'd gotten at a R. Buckminster Fuller exhibition at the Black Mountain College Museum + Art Center in Asheville last year. It fit the bottom of the can, now facing forward, as if made for that purpose, and that’s when I thought of calling it the Dymaxion Film Can Combo Amp/Speaker.

Since I’m not planning to reproduce and market my canjo speaker, I don’t think The Fuller Foundation will bother to come after me for using the brand name, Dymaxion.

And, somehow I don’t think Bucky would mind either.

Sound On My Cloud

There's new music on my SoundCloud page.

Jeez Louise!

Bolokada Conde Djembe Class at Skinny Beats

The Masterful Bolokada Conde at work. Djembe Kan at the Channing Murray Chapel in Urbana, IL, March 2012. Recorded by Sonny Stubble.

There's nothing else like spending over an hour on a rainy Sunday afternoon in Asheville with the djembe master from Guinea, West Africa, the incomparable, world-renowned Bolokada Conde. No, really. Nothing.

Anita and I were fortunate to experience two performances and attend a previous dejembe class hosted by Skinny Beats Drum Shop in Asheville with Bolokada over the past two years. But, this class was a bit more special for me since I was, because of nerve damage in my right wrist that prevents me from playing hand drums like the djembe, allowed to play another West African drum called the doundounba, translated as "big drum" from the Malinke' language, during the class.

The doundounba, which is played with a rather thick drum stick, is typically about 30 inches in length, about 24 inches in diameter and is played horizontally on a stand.  For a right-handed player like me, the right hand plays the skin (usually made from goat or cow hide) while the left hand plays a bell mounted on the drum with a small metal stick. The doundounba, along with its drum cousins, the medium sized sangban, and the even smaller kenkeni, are usually played as a drum ensemble providing a solid, constant rhythm "base" or bed for the djembe player(s). In this particular class the sangban was played by Skinny Beat Drum Shop owner, Billy Zanski, one of Bolokada's students who studied in Africa with him. Another female student was there at class to play the kenkeni.

I was the only one of the three with absolutely no experience playing the doundounba - none, zero, nada. Me, standing closely behind and a bit to the right of The Djembe Master of the World. Had I, once again, bitten off more than I could chew? Would I choke? There seemed to be a good possibility that I would not be able to perform my role as The World's Most Inexperienced Doundounfola (one who plays doundoun).

Bolokada quickly gave me the beat I was supposed to play, I tried it a few times (all with mistakes), and he moved on to Billy on the sangban and the woman on kenkeni who both played their parts correctly with no trouble.

I'm dead, I thought, and I have entered musical Hell.

It was like standing behind Eric Clapton with my little electric bass strapped around my neck and being expected to accompany Slow Hand with a steady bass riff as he gives a class on the finer points of playing blues guitar. Except that at least I have heard a lot of blues tunes, Eric Clapton's playing is usually in 4/4 tempo, and I have been playing bass guitar for years. The music of West Africa is, may I humbly admit, foreign to me, which is ironically why I wanted to take the class in the first place. I had no idea that I would be required to provide a consistent metronome-like tempo for the class. Yikes, indeed! 

Well, to make a long story short, at the very least I didn't give up. Luckily, Billy Zanski was right behind me prompting the downbeat (or was it the upbeat?) whenever I completely lost it even though he continued playing his sangban with a different rhythm pattern than mine. I owe him my life, or at least my confidence to finish the class without bursting into tears and running from the store in embarrassment.

The best part was that Billy told me that I "nailed it". I know he lied but he is a very nice and talented man.  Bolokada turned to me at the end of class and flashed me a big smile with an enthusiastic thumbs up. I really couldn't ask for more encouragement from likely The World's Best Djembefola. Great teachers encourage learning while letting you see their true genius as an attainable goal for even a mere novice like me. If I could only live another 50 years, maybe.

So, I think I'll take a few more lessons, perhaps from Billy at Skinny Drums, and see if there really is an old African guy buried somewhere deep within my Irish brain.

The John Fred Prazen Canjo

The John Fred Prazen, My First Kodakaster Electrified

The addition of a piezo pickup complete with volume control and 1/4 inch guitar cable jack to my John Fred Prazen film canjo seems to be a success so far. It works!!! I plugged it into my DigiTech RP 1000 Guitar Multi-Effects Pedal and and my little Fender Rumble 15 practice amp and, oh my, what a unique sound came from just a few sliding chords with my brass slider.

I put it back together, attached an old camera case strap with nylon chord and, presto! I got me a funky, rustic, three-string, electrified chord banger.

Sonic Duo

Introducing my personal link to the past, my 1963 Fender Duo Sonic

To tell the truth, I don’t even remember buying it, but it was in 1971 when, as a poor film student in LA, I was motivated to spend $65 of my hard-won cash on an old, really beat up Fender Duo Sonic electric guitar. It worked OK with it’s two single wound pickups, plastic pic guard and chromed tone/volume knobs. But the paint was chipping off badly in many places. It actually looked like it had been dragged behind a car for a good while with enough road damage to reveal that three different colors had adorned the solid, Strat-shaped alder body during its life.

Of course, today, road worn vintage guitars of many makers get added value for looking “road worn”, and intentionally ding up beautiful, newly-manufactured classic models to increase their values.  I don’t get it. Yes, I admit it increases their value with certain prople who give a shout about that kind of thing.

Well, I’m sorry, but to me, road-worn equals damaged crap and always has, so that’s when I decided to strip the paint off the body and to attempt a “refinish”, I think it’s called.

The original layers of paint were VERY difficult to remove and took hours of applying the remover goo, scraping the nasty stuff off, and continually washing the remover off my hands since it was so corrosive. I remember that I considered quitting trying to remove the paint several times but, being a film student with some free time, I trudged ahead.  My only regret is that I took no pics of the process with my Pentax Spotmatic 35mm.  I do have this one pic taken in my Hollywood apartment of me playing it but it was taken before my “re-finishing” job. The guitar was blue, the last coat anyway. Red and white where below that, but then finally, just wood.

So, in the tradition of the greatest luthiers, I roughly sanded off the wood surface, stained it walnut with cheap house stain, and liked it much better even though, today, with the market for old really “road worn” guitars, the 1963 Pre-CBS Duo Sonic that I have would probably be worth maybe $1,200 or so since, besides the paint removal and subsequent staining default, it is still a working model with stock parts.  So, in my Woody Allen-ish-ness, I’m pretty sure that by removing the old paint and staining the wood, I actually decreased its value quite a bit..

But, I wouldn’t sell it anyway. And, here’s why. 

I really like that little guitar. Originally designed as a student guitar, the Duo Sonic is light, and it has a scaled down maple neck, so with my stubby little digits, it allows me to reach a bit farther on the chords. The other good news is that the Duo Sonic guitars, in 1963, were manufactured in the same plants, by the same people, with the same materials and to the same standards as all the solid body Strats, Teles, and other solid-body guitars in the Fender line at that time. That's not a bad thing.

It’s really a sturdily built guitar, which is really a good thing considering the lack of attention it has gotten in the 40 plus years I've had it, most of the time not even having the comfort of even a gig bag for protection. Poor thing.

It always works and I don’t know why. The only things I have done for the guitar has been an occasional dusting and finally a new set of strings in over 40 years. But, hey, I didn’t want to over-do the care either.

But, recently I have been thinking that I owe that Duo a bit of gratitude for sticking with me all these years of Neil Young jams (with Neil's recordings, of course) and infrequent practicing.

So, I’ve given her a nice cleaning with shea butter (smells nice, too). I took her to see Asheville’s own Guitar Mama for a good going-over, and the new set of stings I mentioned earlier. (I don’t want you to think that I may have changed the strings two times in 40 years. Oh no, only once.) The Guitar Mama, Autumn, said "It's a nice little guitar - you should keep it", which is a pretty generous appraisal since her store is an Authorized Stringed Instrument Warranty Service Center for Fender Musical Instruments and Autumn is a well-qualified luthier.

I am practicing with the Duo Sonic more often now and having some fun with it, but I do respect its age, even though I was in high school when it was born in California, so it couldn’t be that old. 

Could it?

BTW, did I mention that Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughn owned and played Duo Sonics?

Part of my stringed collection