Custom Built Cigar Box Ukulele

Recently I built this beautiful custom Cigar Box Ukulele for Austin, Texas musician Carolyn Wonderland.

It is made from a black Brick House cigar box, a mahogany neck, ebony fret board, electric pickup, and some cool antique brass. It even has the 1960's Flying Heart inlay done in abalone shell.

Take a look at this beauty!

The re-purposed antique brass came from the historic West Hill Hardware Store in Akron, Ohio.  This is a great old time hardware store with many hard to find parts. I love this store and stop in every chance I get.

See more of my Cigar Box Ukulele's

How to Make a Cigar Box Instrument

I came across this great poster which details how to build a cigar box guitar (or any instrument).

Remember it is basically made from 3 materials:

1. A cigar box
2. A stick of wood
3. Strings

 For more information on or where to purchase this unique one-of-a-kind Americana instruments visit Cigar Box Ukulele's

Daddy Stove Pipe - Does the Delta Blues

I think you will enjoy this artist called Daddy Stove Pipe as he does a masterful gutsy bluesy style of the delta blues for you! All played on his Cigar Box Guitar

Goin' Down South

Slidin' the High Line Enjoy this great slide cigar box guitar!

FREE Cigar Box Album Download! The Budrows!

I have been following the Budrow's, a father and daughter duo, for the past year. They are very versatile in their styles of music. They do a fantastic job with anything from Led Zeppelin to classic blues.

I'm really glad to see they have finally put out an album called "whatcha hear is whatcha get". This FREE CD features excellent electric cigar box guitar playing and super bluesy vocals on classics like:

* pile o' bones
* johnny coldheart
* no luck at all
* into the fire
* little mister
* and more!

I think you love this album as much as I do. Did I mention it was a FREE download?

To get your FREE copy go to http://thebudrows.bandcamp.com/ and click on the Free Download link

Enjoy and send your family and friends back here for their FREE download!
Here is a youtube link for the Budrow's doing a Led Zep song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O62vRv9pomk

Resonator Cigar Box Guitars

Not getting enough sound out of your acoustic cigar box guitar but don’t want to go electric and lug an amp around?

Install a resonator for a really big sound.

According to Wikipedia
A resonator guitar or resophonic guitar is an acoustic guitar whose sound is produced by one or more spun metal cones (resonators) instead of the wooden soundboard (guitar top/face). Resonator guitars were originally designed to be louder than conventional acoustic guitars which were overwhelmed by horns and percussion instruments in dance orchestras. They became prized for their distinctive sound, however, and found life with several musical styles (most notably bluegrass and also blues) well after electric amplification solved the issue of inadequate guitar sound levels.
Resonator guitars are of two styles:
Square necked guitars designed to be played in steel guitar style.
Round necked guitars, which may be played in either the conventional classical guitar style or in the lap steel guitar style.
There are three main resonator designs:
The "tricone" ("tri" in reference to the three metal cones/resonators) design of the first National resonator guitars.
The single cone "biscuit" design of other National instruments.
The single inverted-cone design of the Dobro.
Resonator’s are finding new life in CBG’s. I have taken the liberty of posting some beautiful pictures of some Cigar Box resonator Guitars.

Folks are building there own resonators out of all types of materials.

I recently purchased a lightweight all brass resonator from a fellow in the Cigar Box Guitar community that goes by the name of Old Lowe. They are nicely made and inexpensive. Below is an example of Old Lowes resonator built into a CBG.

Big Sound Cigar Box Guitar youtube

I thought you would enjoy this rendition of the classic song John Henry produced and performed by Moreland and Arbuckle.

These 3 fellas put out a whole lot of sound with some microphones, a set of drums, a harmonica and a 4 string cigar box guitar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyTrbH16LZg

Enjoy the great vocals and root style music offered here. Pay particular attention to the great playing and sound of the cigar box guitar. After listening to a promo posted on http://www.cigarboxnation.com/ I found out this CBG has one bass string which is plugged into a bass amp along with three guitar strings plugged into a regular guitar amp. You can clearly hear the bass notes!

New Tail Vise

As I started my first cuts on the new Cigar Box Lap Steel Guitar build I quickly realized I was working with the wrong vise.

As I was using the Japanese Ryoba handsaw I noticed it was dancing off my marked lines a bit due to vibration. Not wanting to spoil my work I stopped right there and started shopping online for the correct vise to be using.

I finally took the advice of a tool shop I use in Hartville, Ohio named Hartville Tools. They pointed me to Lee Valley Tools in Canada for good quality inexpensive wood vices.

I ended up ordering and receiving, complete with assembly plans, their tail vise screw set with plates and turn handle. I will end up drilling a couple of large holes and adding some wood for the jaws.

All in all this should give me the space and clamping power I need to cut out any vibration so there will be no more dancing off my cutting guidelines.

FREE Christmas Music - Cigar Box Guitar Music

Free Cigar Box Guitar Christmas Music CD download. Yes I said FREE! Share this one with your family and friends! http://www.cigarboxnation.com/

Finished Cuesta Rey Cigar Box Guitar

Alright after a little “fine tuning” so to speak I finally have my latest build the Red Cuesta Rey Cigar Box Guitar to where I like it!

I ended up completely redoing the fret nut and replacing it with of all things a brass toilet bolt. Why you may ask? Simply because it was large enough in diameter to fill my needs. I used a hacksaw blade to deepen some notches in the threads to hold the strings in place.

Completely remaking the bridge was another piece I wanted to change. I ended up using a nice piece of scrap wood called padauk. Padauk has a reddish or orange color to it. I chose padauk because of the overall red background in this particular Cuesta Rey cigar box.

Using my fret saw I placed a cut diagonally across the wood and glued a piece of fret wire in place. From there I sanded off any excess wood so that a slope was created from the edges up to the crown of the fret. This allows the strings to come in contact with the metal fret wire and not the wood.

A bonus I wanted to share with you in having to go find parts for the retrofit. I ended up at my local family owned “non-big box” hardware store. I made new friends, found a potential source from one of the clerks for antique cigar boxes and found the store sells old brass cabinet pull knobs and handles. These knobs and handles look great on CBG’s!

In this particular build I purchased a larger Cuesta Rey cigar box for the main guitar body and a smaller Cuesta Rey cigar box of the same style for parts. I used parts of the smaller box lid to dress up the guitars headstock. I also used a piece of the bottom of the smaller box to dress up the tailpiece.

I did not add a fret board this time around but relied on the natural beauty of red oak that the neck is made out of. The neck was shaped by hand. Since I intended this CBG for all slide work I did not include frets. I did, however, inlay multi-colored wood veneer strips in the correct fret positions.

All in all I am very pleased the way my little red Cuesta Rey cigar box guitar turned out. She sounds great when plugged into an amp!

Update on Cuesta Rey Cigar Box Guitar Build

I had hoped to have pictures of my latest Cigar Box Guitar build the Cuesta Rey to post on this weeks blog, but alas two things happened that prevented that:

1) the fret nut did not turn out the way I wanted it at all, so I am retooling it
2) my wife was at a travel conference and had the “good” camera with her

Here's a picture of a bit of the Cuesta Rey art

Overall I am very pleased with the way the Cuesta Rey turned out. What first caught my eye was the amount of artwork on the box and the vivid colors. What I really like is how the colors came even more alive once I applied a protective top coat.

As I progress in my enjoyment of building CBG’s I find it is a journey of discovery. Discovering the history of the instrument, new sounds, new like minded people, new enjoyment in my own life and different techniques for building and finishing these fantastic instruments.

As an example, CBG’s started becoming popular around 1840 simply because that is when the small cigar box was first manufactured. Before that cigars were shipped in large crates. For a more detailed history visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cigar_box_guitar

You will discover just how versatile this fine little instrument really is, from a gutsy blues to country to mellow ballad to rock. You can play it all on a Cigar Box Guitar. Shane Speal is bringing to light some of the old one string techniques and something he calls the “stubby slide”. Very cool stuff!

I have found so many like minded people across the globe that are building and playing CBG’s. A good place to meet Cigar Box Guitar folks is at http://www.cigarboxnation.com/

One thing I have always enjoyed is music, I love it! Another is working with wood. Building CBG’s gives me great enjoyment and a feeling of accomplishment. 1) I built an instrument and 2) it makes great sounding music

I don’t know about you but I find that when I’m interested in something my creative side comes alive and questions I may have about something seemed to get answered as I work.

Since I have been building CBG’s I have discovered I like to sand the plain wooden boxes down (being careful not to disturb the lettering), use varying coats of stain rubbed into the wood and natural oil or paste to finish it. While on the papered wooden cigar boxes with the beautiful artwork I prefer to use a spray poly as a top coat to protect that artwork.

One more discovery that ties it all together for me was with the need to retool the nut. After work I dropped by our local hardware store. Mind you it is not one of the big box stores like Lowe’s or Home Depot. Family owned since tools were invented. I’m telling the guy I need a large brass bolt for the nut.

He’s showing me what they have and not coming up with anything big enough. I asked what he would suggest. He yells over to the boss and the boss says sounds like you need a brass toilet bolt. Perfect and just the right size!

As I’m checking out I see the boss sorting through a box of old brass knobs and drawer pull handles. I mention how great those would look on my Cigar Box Guitars. One thing leads to another and he tells me how he used to collect old wooden cigar boxes from garage sales. They were closing so I said I would be back.

The CBG discovery trail has opened up a whole new source for friends at the local hardware store, antique brass parts and potentially a source for some antique cigar boxes!

New 3-String Cigar Box Guitar Started

New 3-String Cigar Box Guitar Started

I wanted to post a couple pictures of my new build. It’s going to be a fretless 3-string cigar box guitar. Fretless in that there will not be regular frets installed. In their place will be inlayed veneer to mark the fret positions which are laid out to a Fender scale.

This layout will be perfect for slide guitar work.

I chose a wooden Cuesta-Rey Centro Fino cigar box from the Dominican Republic for the body and a nice piece of red oak for the neck. I enjoy the artwork a lot with the lovely senorita having red blossoms in her hair and palm trees to the sides. The beautiful dark reds, golds, yellows and blues really appealed to me. The thought of putting sound holes in this great looking box disturbs me somewhat. Oh well, CBG building is all about repurposing, rebuilding and remaking one thing into another.

I used to cut all the frets with a coping saw but I really like the perfection of a fret slotting saw and miter box which I show in this picture.

It lives!

After much trial and error I finally have my first Cigar Box Guitar up and running!! I plugged it into the amp last night startled the cats, made the dog bark and woke my wife up! So I guess electrically it's a success. I felt a bit like Dr. Frankenstein when he threw the switch and exclaimed to Egore, "He's alive, he's alive!"

Pics and Utube to follow!