Stringed Instrument Made From a Wooden Branch: Unique DIY
Introduction
Ok. This stringed instrument is not mine. It was presented to me by my good friend. Here’s the story. One sunny day or maybe not so sunny, a municipal service car appeared on the street. They decided to cut a huge old tree near my friend’s house. And my friend took a piece of the huge branch of the tree. For good memories.
Overview
Then later he got an idea to make something if not useful but at least meaningful from this branch. So he cut it again, this time along the branch. He also made 2 grooves on the opposite side to rest the thing on the laps.
This is how the stringed instrument was born
Then he put 8 piano tuners into side which supposed to be a headstock.
A few more tricks like an improvised tailpiece and a bridge made from the longest bolt and the stringed instrument was ready.
My addition was a piezo pickup. I have attached it to the lower part of the branch. The input jack of it I fixed at the lower side.
I had to buy a piano tuning key to tune this thing. The process of tuning this stringed instrument took some time. The tuners are inserted into the holes in the wood. It is not a very stable solution. And it works so far, but it makes the tuning a bit awkward process.
That’s the way how to use this stringed instrument during playing (Image above).
Oh, and it has no frets, so you have to rely on your ears only.
Missing Strings
You probably noticed that I stringed it with a standard 6 strings set while the instrument has 8 tuners.
That’s right. My friend had an idea to put 2 more strings.
One is on the high end which shoud be a 007 gauge.
And one’s on the lowest which probably would be the thinnest one from the bass strings set.
So far, I have focused on the sound quality which I describe in the next section. But eventually, I certainly will experiment with the 8 strings approach.
Update. Piezo Pickup Issue.
I was wrong about piezo pickup on this instrument. Piezo works fine on any resonating surface which any conventional instrument has. Either it’s a wooden or plywood deck of any guitar or even the plywood of the cigar box. But on the thick piece of wood, it sounds horrible. Not any pedals or preamps would help. I usually use R.L.Baggs Para Acoustic D.I. preamp which usually helps to improve the sound. But not in this case. The sound is dull. And on a high sounds it’s even worse.
Conclusion
There is no final conclusion for this post. It’s a lasting story.
A magnetic pickup should be a solution. I will return back to this page when the replacement will be done.
So,stay tuned!
