Having run through the process once with the Ripple Fiddle, I was ready to tackle the cello, starting with a review of the "prototype". I met with Mia and her colleague, violinist and musical improvisor Alisa Rose, who is interested in the project. They were both...
A commission from Bay Area cellist, composer, and songwriter, Mia Pixley led to a creative partnership and the development of one of the few new sounds ever to be added to acoustic bowed instruments. Mia was interested in the Off Beat Fiddles. In her performances Mia...
The Tabolin was strung up and played with different configurations of weights on the velum panels. https://youtu.be/cMvSN32r9Pc Thanks to my friends Gabriel Wheaton and Joe Peterson, who helped me sound test the Tabolin Results With no weights The Tabolin is...
A collection of instruments for tonal and aesthetic exploration. This began as a Covid project. I'd long wanted to make an instrument that showed off some of the the attractive stages that the violin goes through during the construction process. The Dimpled Viola made...
In part 1 of this post I discussed the ideas behind the hybrid "Tabolin". The instrument is part violin, part tabla drum and will feature tunable, resonant panels of velum in the body. I hope that the fiddle will have will have playing qualities similar to a Viola...
Following on from earlier experimental fiddles I’ve been thinking of making a violin with very thin areas or cells in the upper and lower bouts. This has led to the idea of a violin with many drum like panels.
This is so gratifying! Thanks to every one who has been involved, this is far from a solo effort. You can get a digital version of the Strings story. Also read more about the project on The Redwood Violin Website Earlier Press The project also received local press...
On January 1st this year I effectively quit my violinmaking day job and devoted myself fulltime to the Redwood Violin Project. The idea was to make a violin, from scratch, using only materials from within 25 miles of my house. I asked for help with making the violin...
Carving the plates Carving the plates for the X and O fiddles was fairly straight forward. The basic design of the plates is "strong in the middle with thinner areas in the upper and lower bouts". The plates ended up with thicknesses in the bouts that ranged...
When I presented the first two unusual fiddles on social media people naturally wanted to know how they sound. Here they are compared to two instruments of the same model, dimensions and wood. Make your own judgement, but to me they sound quite normal, I think that...