Search results (tags) for: "instruments"

Making Handmade Musical Instruments

2008-09-12T16:42:00Z

You don't need a lot of cash to make music. The folks in these videos all made their own instruments and are sharing them with the world through video. Check the related items for some fantastic handmade musical instruments on Etsy. If you know of a great handmade music video or item on Etsy, share the links in the comments!

What do you get when cross an oil can with a banjo? The canjo!

Wow, it's an upright bass made of cardboard and it sounds pretty good!

I've always wanted to make a cigar box guitar. This one sounds amazing!

Dennis Havlena makes all sorts of instruments and shares them in this video.

Electric Junk Guitar Workshop from ranjit on Vimeo.

Inspired? On October 14th, you can take the guitar making class at Etsy Labs featured in the above video.

Also if you haven't seen the Etsy Handmade Portrait about Armor Guitars, check it out.

Handmade Music Night 2008.07.08

2008-07-08T11:22:00Z

Handmade Music Night at the Etsy Labs is back on Tuesday July, 8th 2008! Brought to you by the usual suspects Etsy, Make Magazine, and Create Digital Music, this mid-summer Handmade Music Night is bound to be a #1 stunner! Here's a video about making your own instruments that features a past iteration of this event:

TUESDAY, TUESDAY, TUESDAY: artists, crafters, makers, musicians, and hackers unite to bedazzle you with chiptune gaming systems for music, strange alternative MIDI controllers and sound-mangling custom software, repurposed vintage synthesizer chips made famous by the Commodore 64, digital visuals, a musical Nintendo Wii balance board, wireless sensing controllers, and much much more! Come on down and check out this F-R-E-E community event, right here in Brooklyn at the Etsy Labs space.

If you have an awesome instrument that you made and would like to share, feel free to bring it on down and share in the community fun, if not just bring yourself and enjoy the festivities!

Handmade Music Night
7/8/08 - 7pm
Etsy Labs
325 Gold St., 3rd floor
Brooklyn, NY

Map

See our past coverage of these musical evenings.

Also, if you are in the Brooklyn area and want to learn to make your own guitar, be sure to sign up soon for this class taught by Ranjit of Handmade Music Night.

My Visit to a Luthier in Tennessee

2008-06-13T15:24:00Z

MP4 | Youtube | Blip.tv | Subscribe in iTunes

In early May I went to Barren Plains, Tennessee to visit James Peters, a luthier and Etsy seller Armor Guitars. He plys a trade after my own heart, as a fellow woodworker, though I’ve yet to muster the patience required to build a fine instrument.

I remember when James first joined Etsy and listed a guitar. It was something I’d been waiting for with patient curiosity – when would the woodworkers appear? (There are now dozens of them, I’m happy to report.)

To coincide with the re-launch of Alchemy, I requested a custom guitar from James. The supreme benefit of a handmade guitar is working with the maker to spec out the instrument. James asked a lot of questions and I answered as many as I could. I knew I wanted something smaller than a dreadnought, and with a well-defined “waist” (in geetar terms).

He told me what he had, including wood from an old piano that would be used for the soundboard (the top). He mentioned things I had never heard of, like a side port so the player can better monitor his or her own sound.

At the heart of Etsy is the connection between the maker and the buyer. So when James began building my guitar, I asked if I could drop in for a visit. We’d recently begun making our Handmade Video Portraits, and I thought he would make a rich subject for such a portrait.

Tara and I headed to LaGuardia airport here in NYC, and a couple hours later were “deplaning” (when did this become a word? they used it over the intercom) in Nashville. James lives about an hour north of the city, so we rented a car and drove through the flat countryside up to Springfield.

We drove past James’s house a couple times before catching the entrance to his gravel driveway, where a large ruddy dog named Jazz announced us. After meeting James and his family (who are also Etsy sellers), he led us over to a small structure beside his house. Inside, a cornucopia of tools and the smell of sawdust greeted us.

James gave us an eight foot by eight foot tour, up and down the woodshop. Everything inside had a story behind it, including his handmade jigs.

Day turned to night, and we ate a home-cooked dinner around the fire pit on his back porch. A musical family, James, Laura, Cody, and Carson, played songs until a light rain began. It felt like a Tennessee night as we drank Tennessee moonshine; it felt worlds away from my Brooklyn home.

That night Tara and I drove back to Nashville through the winding country roads, missing most major turns at least once. We were staying at a B&B that looked like something from a children’s doll closet, and smelled like old books.

The next day as we pulled into James’s driveway, he greeted us with his morning coffee in one hand, a cigarette in the other, and this prediction: “Looks like a tornado later today.”

Tara set up the lights and camera in his woodshop while James and I paced around the several-acre property. Towards the back was a half-standing wood-framed hut, looking tired in the tall grass. Jazz scouted the perimeter for intruders and small game as James talked about the future. The hut could be a guest house, I could help fix it up.

When the filming began, James sat in the bright studio light, facing me and trying not to look at the camera. This took a bit of getting used to, but he soon settled into his easy wisdom and the portrait proceeded. At the end he played a couple songs for us which is all I’ll say about that. Nothing I type can color them in. (Watch the videos for South and Let Her Go.)

The day ran on like days are wont to do. The sky that foretold a tornado gathered but did not fall, and after a thunderstorm it was a big blue expanse again. James and his family went about their daily work: he carved, she painted, others read and like a subway platform, every now and then I heard live music from somewhere in the house.

I was looking forward to another night around the fire, but there were things to do back in Nashville. Tara and I met up with several other Etsy sellers, Mary Ink and Betty Turbo, and then went down to Broadway for a night on the town. All I can say is, where have all the acoustic guitars gone in Nashville? It was all flash electric whizzin’.

I miss James, his family, his house, his woodshop and Jazz. I left Tennessee with the hope that my guitar, as I’d left it, would be completed over the next month. James even hinted that he might deliver it in person to Brooklyn.

Packing up that hope, I flew back home just in time for a board meeting and the noisy hustle of New York City.

Postscript:

Alas James had to mail the guitar because he had some gigging to do. Here it is, in its new Brooklyn home. James keeps checking in, making sure I'm feeding it well and giving it plenty of exercise.

[photo by Vanessa]

See our other post with ArmorGuitars and other Handmade Video Portraits.

Handmade Portraits: Armor Guitars

2008-06-09T18:24:00Z

MP4 | Youtube | Blip.tv | Subscribe in iTunes

James Peters enjoys what he does. Waking up every morning and working in his woodshop in the back of his house is the "bees knees" as James says. Once there, he makes custom acoustic guitars. He is, as it's called, a luthier based in Springfield, TN.

After moving to Nashville in 1989 and having some success in the country music songwriting industry, a friend asked James to repair his guitar. It was after that experience that he realized it would be easier — and more enjoyable — to build acoustic guitars from scratch rather than repair old ones. That's when James started Armor Guitars. He's never looked back.

It turns out that James and Laura Peters (and their sons Cody and Carson) are one of the first families making a living selling their handmade wares on Etsy. Laura's Etsy shop is EarthArt (recently profiled as an Etsy Success Story) and Cody, one of their sons, is BarbedWire. They reside in the country, make music and art together, and live in what Laura calls "a little Shangri Las." Laura's advice to everyone is to turn off your television and she cites this as one of the many reasons that the Peters family is so close and creative.

James Peters doesn't just make guitars: he has been a musician most of his life. Below are two songs performed by James.

This song is called "South" and was written by James Peters, Gerald Guinn and Yvonne Guinn

The song is called "Let Her Go" and was written by James Peters and Susan Gilbert.

Watch our other Handmade Video Portraits and subscribe to our Youtube Channel!

Handmade Music Night Featured on Current TV

2008-05-16T12:01:00Z

Current TV visited Etsy, Make Magazine, and CreateDigitalMusic's Handmade Music Night at the Etsy Labs this spring. It's an experience of wonder and geekery! Their video has been posted...Perhaps it will make it to their TV channel if you give it some love on their site!

Here are some more posts about Handmade Music Night.

Hey! Log into Current.com to give us a thumbs up on this page!

Etsy Finds: Handmade Music-makers

2007-11-19T07:38:00Z

Do you have a hard-to-shop-for musician on your gift-giving list this holiday season? A sardine can turned handmade thumb piano from RootsProd sounds like the perfect gift!

Andrew Masters of Roots Production is an artist who has been building musical instruments out of found and recycled objects for more than 12 years. Many of these amazing sound-makers are in the lamellophone family, which typically have a series of thin tongues that are plucked with the fingers or thumbs to create sound. Andrew's instruments also feature his own original artwork in vibrant colors and often have playful faces that give life to the "voice" of each piece.

Check out this video that demonstrates how these little beauties sound:

You can see and hear more about Andrew and his creations on his website, RootsProduction.com.

Handmade Music Night- Thursday 11/15 8:00pm

2007-11-14T09:57:00Z

Handmade Music Night is back!

The semi-regular evening of DIY musical oddities brought to you by Etsy, Create Digital Music, and Make Magazine, will mercilessly descend upon yet another peaceful Brooklyn evening. Expect an informal, free party + show and tell + science fair featuring self-made electronic musical projects.

Already confirmed for the lineup:

The MIDI Pick, a pressure-sensitive DIY digital guitar pick by Roy Vanegas
Mystery musical controllers from Eric Singer, the mind behind the world-infamous LEMUR, an educational outlet in Brooklyn and collective of musical robot/electronics-creating artists
Theremin-playing robots and possibly other surprises from series favorite Ranjit Bhatnagar. (See the Theremin robots in action, covering Gnarls Barkley. If we’re really lucky, Ranjit will bring his students. Students, if you’re listening, we’d love to have you there!
David Brynjar Franzson with a generative piece using custom software built in Max/MSP

Also, CDM's Peter Kirn will have a new iteration of his video/gesture-controlled musical creation, which allows users to virtually navigate musical structures via a webcam/DV cam.

Please join us!

Thursday, November 15, 8PM. Etsy Labs. 325 Gold St. 6th Floor. Brooklyn. See you!

Etsy Finds: FluteTronic

2007-11-05T01:46:00Z

As a wanna-be musician, I'm always on the lookout for new-fangled ways to make unusual sounds. This electronic flute, the FluteTronic, by rarebeasts caught my eye as I was taking my daily jaunt through Etsy listings. You play it like a normal flute, but the noise that comes out is something akin to a heavy-metal tune by the band Air. Perfect for someone who has no idea how to really play a woodwind, but wants to lay down some radical sounds. Flute-style.

Handmade Music Night Has Returned!

2007-09-24T12:20:00Z

HANDMADE MUSIC NIGHT: Thursday, 9/27 at 8PM

Handmade Music is an evening of original creations for music making, open to the creative minds of the New York area. It's equal parts party, show-and-tell, performance, and science fair, open to whatever oddball software and hardware people want to bring, complete or not. Some come with projects, others just to hear and see unusual new instruments, from software to game systems to homemade electronic instruments. Each installment brings plenty of surprises, but appearances confirmed for this one include:

* A featured performance by Richard Lainhart, a renowned electronic improviser and innovator.

* Seven-foot tall "Suburbanite" aka "60 Switches of Fury", a music controller by Eric Johnson.

* The Monome, a minimalist open-source hardware controller with grids of buttons.

* A fluid musical instrument controller entirely by webcam, by Peter Kirn.

* Lots of other things that may just appear.

Handmade Music Night is a convergence of the music community/blog CreateDigitalMusic.com, the kings and queens of all things DIY at Make Magazine and the Etsy Labs.

It's all happening at Brooklyn's community workshop, Etsy Labs, on Thursday, September 27th, at 8 PM.

We are located at:

325 Gold Street, 6th Fl.

Brooklyn, NY 11201

Take the A/C/F to Jay St. or B/M/Q/R to DeKalb.

See you there!

Handmade Music #2

2007-08-31T20:00:00Z

Big shout-out to MAKE magazine, Create Digital Music and the Etsy Labs for a job well done at last night’s Handmade Music Night. There were crazy interactive electronic doodads, lots of buttons and knobs, projections and a good time had by all. Check out the photos on Flickr for the full experience!

Here's the video we shot from the first Handmade Music night:

P.S. And the above photo is by Peter Kern of Create Digital Music and Create Digital Motion! Also, to the guy who’s in the photo and his lady are Monome, are a “small collective based in Philadelphia. [They] aim to refine the way people consider interface.”