Tuesday, December 21, 2010

What do you expect from catgut and horsehair?

As many (!) of you may know, Bbob is a creator of instruments, many of them electronic in nature (you can go check out fluxmonkeydotcom/electronoizedothtm for more info), but he has also made some a bit more instrumental in a somewhat traditional sense, such as the 'cellhole, which was a kind of 'cello built on the body of an old acoustic guitar (a Harmony?).  There was also a metal potlid involved, and a pickup.  The tones tended to be a bit harsh, but some sweet sounds could be coaxed from it.

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Anyway, back in the 80s, when Bbob was Luigi and I was thin, we had a duo called the Whistlepigs from Zenar which specialized in old-timey music (Bbob on banjo and me on acoustic guitar).  After one of our gigs, Bbob and this sad-faced young old-timey fiddler of our acquaintance came over to my house to hang out.  The fiddler was, you could say, a tad more serious about his old-timey music.  I loved the stuff, though my playing of it was spastic, but I was also interested in a slew of other musics...So, I put on this record by Polly Bradfield, and the young old-timey fiddler exclaimed "I've been trying to make the 'cellhole sound like a violin, and she's making her violin sound like the 'cellhole!"

Click on the header to hear some Polly Bradfield...

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