The How-To Repository for the Cigar Box Guitar Movement!
How to Build and Play Cigar Box Guitars and other Homemade Instruments
An auction description for this poster stated “The Experience messing around, and Jimi playing a broom.” Who wouldn’t love to hear what that simple diddley bow could do in the hands of a master like Hendrix?
Another site states that this was a part of a 20-photo shoot done at the Seven And A Half Club in London. The club was in the process of being renovated, and the musicians grabbed some of the tools for the photo (hence the saw and hammer).
We just added a new entry to the library, an article telling the story of the man who is largely responsible for the existence of the modern cigar box guitar movement.
Shane Speal started building cigar box guitars in 1993, and from that time has been tirelessly promoting the instrument, performing onstage with them, and creating online communities to help people discover the instrument and start building their own. He took the title “King of the Cigar Box Guitar” back when such a title seemed full of irony – who would want to be the king of such a crazy, primitive, mostly forgotten instrument?
This article by Glenn Watt re-introduces Shane Speal to those who may never have heard of him. For 22 years he has been building, playing, and preaching cigar box guitars.
Click the image or link above to view the full article.
Our friends John Nickel of Nickel Cigar Box Guitars and Joe McCormack of ALNA Cigar Box Guitars recently spent some time in front of the cameras, talking cigar box guitars with Fred Hunter of the Absolutely Alamaba TV show. John and Joe run the world’s first cigar box guitar retail shop down in Huntsville, Alabama, and are the center of an amazing community of builders and players in that area.
CigarBoxNation.com has just posted the Summer 2015 guide to all of the main cigar box guitar festivals taking place in the United States and abroad. From the oldest festival (11th annual in Huntsville, AL) to the ones just getting started, it’s going to be a great year for CBG fests! Come on out to the ones nearest you to see great live music, check out cigar box guitar vendors and meet some of your fellow enthusiasts.
We’ve just added a new photo gallery to the library, this one made up of photos of celebrities holding/playing cigar box guitars.
The photo to the left shows Tom Johnston, one of the founders of the Doobie Brothers, checking out a cigar box guitar made for him by Greg Campbell.
Click here, or on the photo to the left, to view the full gallery.
Did you know that we have a collection of Patriotic and other “Americana” song tablature in our knowledgebase library?
For the one-string canjo, we have My Country ‘Tis of Thee.
For 3-string Cigar Box Guitars (tuned to Open G GDG), we have America’s anthem, The Star Spangled Banner, arranged by Glenn Watt.
As an added bonus, we have Woodie Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land, a classic folk song celebrating the wide expanse of America’s beauty.
Have a happy Memorial Day weekend!
We have just added two new historical video clips to the library here on CigarBoxGuitar.com, both from the late 1920’s in New Orleans. The first shows a “spasm band” in action, complete with homemade drum sets and dancing kids. The second shows more dancing and another homemade drum kit, with the player being possibly identified as “Cocomo” Joe Barthelemy, a long-time New Orleans jazz musician and street performer.
Click here to check out the Historic Video section of our knowledgebase library, or click the image to the left (a screen capture from the video, thought to show Cocomo Joe Barthelemy playing his homemade drum kit in 1928).
These early spasm band performers were some of the forerunners of the modern Jazz genre, and it’s really cool that so many of them utilized homemade instruments.
DUHN DUHN DUHN, DUHN DUHN DAH DUHN…
DUHN DUHN DUHN, DAH DUHN
(dun dun dun dun dun)
Here it is, the easiest-to-play and most recognizable rock and roll riff of all time: the opening riff to Smoke on the Water. Turns out, you can play it on your 3-string Open G GDG cigar box guitar with just one finger.
If you only learn one song on the cigar box guitar, it should probably be this one. In a short video, Ben “C. B. Gitty” Baker walks you through just how easy it is to play this classic rock and roll anthem.
We’ve just added a new piece of tablature for 3-string cigar box guitars to the knowledge-base, for a song that has one of the most recognizable melody riffs in all of Rock & Roll: Blister in the Sun by the Violent Femmes. This is a nice easy one to play on a 3-string cigar box guitar (or other homemade instrument) tuned to Open G GDG, so download this free tablature sheet and give it a try.
There’s even a demo video where Ben “C. B. Gitty” Baker shows you how to play it!
A new set of free plans for 3-string cigar box guitars has just been added to our knowledgebase library here on CigarBoxGuitar.com. Written by Ben “C. B. Gitty” Baker, these 8 pages of how-to walk you through the process building your first 3-string slide cigar box guitar. A complete list of all the parts and tools you’ll need is included, along with links and tips on where to get some of the parts. The assembly steps are clear and easy to follow, with lots of photos to help you along the way.
It has never been easier to build your own cigar box guitar. YOU CAN DO IT!
If you have ever thought about adding a scarf joint to your cigar box guitar necks, but have been unsure whether you could pull it off, this video is for you! Glenn walks you through all of the steps it takes to create a scarf jointed headstock with just hand tools, bringing it into the realm of possibility for almost anyone.
While some care and attention to detail is required, creating a nice scarf joint is not as hard as you may think, and is definitely worth the effort. So click on through to the knowledgebase entry for the video and give it a watch (there are even some bloopers and out-takes at the end). You’ll be glad you did!
Nick Krissie is a teacher at the Sunset School in Coos Bay, Oregon. He recently started a series of handmade instrument building workshops with students in the school, focused on teaching them to both build and play instruments like cigar box guitars.
Recently Nick sent us some photographs of something special one of his fifth-graders had brought in. Entirely of his own volition, outside of school, this youngster build his very own diddley bow out of a tree branch, some screws and a length of wire.
“From what he told me he has a hand saw he used to cut the branch and I am not sure about a drill for the screws,” Krissie said. “The bridge is nailed in but it was loose so he lashed it with tape. He wanted to use a can for a resonator but he couldn’t get it to fit. I might help him make a pickup to put on it. The string is very tight and the stick is fairly short so it is high pitched. He was using a little plastic flashlight as a slide.”
For us, this strikes right to the core of what the handmade music movement is all about. A simple instrument like this, built by a creative and inquisitive child, takes the idea of musical instruments back to its most fundamental, personal roots, as far as you can get from the shiny, clear-coated, mass-produced Tele clones being cranked out of factories all over the world.
This is where it begins, and what it’s all about. We need more fifth graders making diddley bows in this world.
