Experimental luthier - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Experimental luthiers are luthier

Luthier

A luthier is someone who makes or repairs lutes and other string instruments. In the United States, the term is used interchangeably with a term for the specialty of each maker, such as violinmaker, guitar maker, lute maker, etc...

s who take part in alternate stringed instrument manufacturing (such as the guitar, violin) or create original string-instruments altogether. Notable experimental luthiers include Yuri Landman

Yuri Landman

Yuri Landman is a Dutch experimental luthier who has made several experimental electric string instruments for a list of artists including Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth, Liars, Jad Fair of Half Japanese and Liam Finn...

, Bradford Reed

Bradford Reed

Bradford Reed is an American multi-instrumentalist, experimental luthier, and member of avant-garde band King Missile III. He is proficient at such instruments as drums, guitar, melodica, piano, and synthesizer. In the 1980s he invented the pencilina, a custom-made string instrument.-Pencilina:The...

, and Hans Reichel

Hans Reichel

Hans Reichel was a German improvisational guitarist, experimental luthier, inventor, and type designer.-Career:...

Plucked instruments

Most known example is probably the Chapman Stick

Chapman Stick

The Chapman Stick is an electric musical instrument devised by Emmett Chapman in the early 1970s. A member of the guitar family, the Chapman Stick usually has ten or twelve individually tuned strings and has been used on music recordings to play bass lines, melody lines, chords or textures...

which was developed in the early '70s by Emmett Chapman. The Warr Guitar

Warr guitar

Warr Guitars is a company that manufactures the Warr Guitar, a guitar like musical instrument developed by the company's founder, Mark Warr.-Description:The Warr Guitar resembles a standard electric guitar, albeit with a very low action and more strings...

and the Kelstone (from Belgium) are alternate instruments which function on the same playing technique.
The Gittler guitar

Gittler guitar

A Gittler Guitar is an experimental designed guitar created by Allan Gittler . Gittler felt that sentimental design references to acoustic guitars are unnecessary in an electronically amplified guitar, and designed his instrument with the objective of reducing the electric guitar to the most...

is an experimental designed guitar created by Allan Gittler (1928–2003). Gittler realized that sentimental design references to acoustic guitars are unnecessary in an electronically amplified guitar, and designed his instrument with the objective of reducing the electric guitar to the most minimal functional form possible. He made 60 guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

s in New York in the mid 1970s to early 1980s.

In the experimental rock

Experimental rock

Experimental rock or avant-garde rock is a type of music based on rock which experiments with the basic elements of the genre, or which pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique....

and free jazz

Free jazz

Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...

scenes many guitar players began modifying their guitars in the tradition of John Cage

John Cage

John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, writer, philosopher and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde...

's prepared piano

Prepared piano

A prepared piano is a piano that has had its sound altered by placing objects between or on the strings or on the hammers or dampers....

. Keith Rowe

Keith Rowe

Keith Rowe is an English free improvisation tabletop guitarist and painter. Rowe is a founding member of both the hugely influential AMM in the mid-1960s and M.I.M.E.O. Having trained as a visual artist, Rowe's paintings have been featured on most of his own albums...

and Fred Frith

Fred Frith

Fred Frith is an English multi-instrumentalist, composer and improvisor.Probably best known for his guitar work, Frith first came to attention as one of the founding members of the English avant-rock group Henry Cow. Frith was also a member of Art Bears, Massacre and Skeleton Crew...

became most well-known for playing these prepared guitar

Prepared guitar

A prepared guitar is a guitar that has had its timbre altered by placing various objects on or between the instrument's strings, including other extended techniques...

s. The latter also crafted experimental table string instruments. In the early 80s Glenn Branca

Glenn Branca

Glenn Branca is an American avant-garde composer and guitarist known for his use of volume, alternative guitar tunings, repetition, droning, and the harmonic series. In 2008 he was awarded an unrestricted grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts.-Beginnings: 1960s and early 1970s:Branca...

started building his own electric string instruments, called 'mallet guitars', based on the harmonic canons of Harry Partch

Harry Partch

Harry Partch was an American composer and instrument creator. He was one of the first twentieth-century composers to work extensively and systematically with microtonal scales, writing much of his music for custom-made instruments that he built himself, tuned in 11-limit just intonation.-Early...

. Around the same time Hans Reichel

Hans Reichel

Hans Reichel was a German improvisational guitarist, experimental luthier, inventor, and type designer.-Career:...

built several 3rd bridge guitars before he invented his daxophone

Daxophone

The daxophone, invented by Hans Reichel, is an experimental musical instrument of the friction idiophones category. It consists of a thin wooden blade fixed in a wooden block , which holds one or more contact microphones...

, which is what he's mostly known for. Bradford Reed developed his Pencilina in the mid 80s. The Whamola

Whamola

The Whamola is a bass instrument used in funk-jazz styles of music. The name is a portmanteau of whammy bar and viola.The Whamola is a direct descendant of the washtub bass, an American folk instrument popular with skiffle and jug bands, and features a single string which is manipulated via a...

, based on the Washtub bass

Washtub bass

The washtub bass, or "gutbucket", is a stringed instrument used in American folk music that uses a metal washtub as a resonator. Although it is possible for a washtub bass to have four or more strings and tuning pegs, traditional washtub basses have a single string whose pitch is adjusted by...

was developed in the nineties and became mostly famous because Les Claypool

Les Claypool

Leslie Edward "Les" Claypool is an American musician and writer, best known as the lead vocalist and bassist in the band Primus. Claypool's playing style on the electric bass mixes tapping, flamenco-like strumming, whammy bar bends and slapping.Claypool has also self produced and engineered his...

plays on it.

In the 2000s, Canadian luthier

Luthier

Linda Manzer

Linda Manzer is a Canadian master luthier renowned for her archtop, flat-top and harp acoustic guitars.She received her training from Jean Larrivée between 1974 and 1978 and later studied with the late Jimmy D'Aquisto in New York....

created the Pikasso guitar

Pikasso guitar

The Pikasso Guitar, or Pikasso I, is a custom made harp guitar created by Canadian luthier Linda Manzer.Its name is ostensibly derived from its likeness in appearance to the cubist works of Pablo Picasso.-Players:...

, a 42-string guitar with three necks. It was popularized by jazz guitarist Pat Metheny

Pat Metheny

Patrick Bruce "Pat" Metheny is an American jazz guitarist and composer.One of the most successful and critically acclaimed jazz musicians to come to prominence in the 1970s and '80s, he is the leader of the Pat Metheny Group and is also involved in duets, solo works and other side projects...

, who used it on the song "Into the Dream" and on several albums. Its name is ostensibly derived from its likeness in appearance to the cubist

Cubism

Cubism was a 20th century avant-garde art movement, pioneered by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture...

works of Pablo Picasso

Pablo Picasso

Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...

. In 2003 the Tritare

Tritare

A tritare is an experimental guitar invented in 2003 by Samuel Gaudet and Claude Gauthier of the University of Moncton of a family of stringed instruments which use Y-shaped strings, instead of the usual string-shaped strings; Y-shaped strings can produce sounds which are harmonic integer...

was created by Samuel Gaudet and Claude Gauthier in Canada. In 2006 Yuri Landman

Yuri Landman

built his Moodswinger

Moodswinger

The Moodswinger is a twelve string electric zither with an additional third bridge designed by Yuri Landman. The rod which functions as the third bridge divides the strings into two sections to cause an overtone multiphonic sound...

for the band Liars and afterwards made a large serie of alternate string instruments like the Moonlander for Sonic Youth

Sonic Youth

Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...

's Lee Ranaldo

Lee Ranaldo

Lee M. Ranaldo is an American singer, guitarist, writer, record producer, and visual artist, best known as a co-founder of the alternative rock band Sonic Youth...

, the Springtime

Springtime (guitar)

The Springtime is an experimental electric guitar with seven strings and three outputs. The instrument was created in 2008 by Dutch luthier Yuri Landman for guitar player Laura-Mary Carter of Blood Red Shoes.-Technical information:...

for Blood Red Shoes

Blood Red Shoes

Blood Red Shoes are an indie rock duo from Brighton, England. They have released two full-length albums, Box of Secrets and Fire Like This, plus a slew of early singles on limited 7" vinyl pressings.-Formation:...

and the Tafelberg

Tafelberg

Tafelberg is Dutch and Afrikaans for "table mountain". It may refer to:*Table Mountain, a flat-topped mountain overlooking Cape Town, South Africa*Tafelberg, Suriname, a mountain in Suriname...

drum guitar for The Dodos

The Dodos

The Dodos are an American indie rock band consisting of Meric Long and Logan Kroeber.- History :The Dodos began playing music together in 2005, when musician Meric Long, who had been gigging steadily in San Francisco as a solo singer-songwriter, was introduced to Logan Kroeber through a mutual...

and others. Micachu

Micachu

Mica Levi, known by her stage name Micachu , is an English singer, songwriter, composer, and producer. She is classically trained and is best known for experimental music in a variety of genres.-Biography:...

made a few string instruments of which one is called the 'Chu'. One of the strings of the Chu carries a large series of small rings and sounds like a snare drum

Snare drum

The snare drum or side drum is a melodic percussion instrument with strands of snares made of curled metal wire, metal cable, plastic cable, or gut cords stretched across the drumhead, typically the bottom. Pipe and tabor and some military snare drums often have a second set of snares on the bottom...

when it is being plucked.

Bowed instruments

The bazantar

Bazantar

The bazantar is a custom made string instrument invented by musician Mark Deutsch, who worked on the design between 1993 and 1997 .The bazantar is a five string double bass with 29 sympathetic and 4 drone strings and has a melodic range of five octaves...

is a five-string double bass

Double bass

The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...

with 29 sympathetic and 4 drone string

Drone

-Nature:The male sex of social Hymenopterans, such as a* Drone * male wasp* male ant-Chemicals:An abbreviation referring to one of two psychoactive drugs:* Mephedrone* 4-Methoxymethcathinone, commonly known as methedrone-Vehicles:...

s and has a melodic range of five octave

Octave

In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...

s invented by musician Mark Deutsch, who worked on the design between 1993 and 1997 ( issued March 16, 1999). It is designed as a separate housing for sympathetic strings (to deal with the increased string tension) mountable on a double bass or cello

Cello

The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

, modified to hold drone strings.
The Japanese multi-instrumentalist and experimental musical instrument builder Yuichi Onoue developed a two string hurdy gurdy

Hurdy gurdy

The hurdy gurdy or hurdy-gurdy is a stringed musical instrument that produces sound by a crank-turned rosined wheel rubbing against the strings. The wheel functions much like a violin bow, and single notes played on the instrument sound similar to a violin...

like fretless violin, called the kaisatsuko

Kaisatsuko

The kaisatsuko is an electric experimental musical instrument invented by Yuichi Onoue of Tokyo, Japan....

as well as a deeply scalloped electric guitar for microtonal

Microtonal music

Microtonal music is music using microtones—intervals of less than an equally spaced semitone. Microtonal music can also refer to music which uses intervals not found in the Western system of 12 equal intervals to the octave.-Terminology:...

playing techniques.

Other

An example of an original stringed instrument is the creation of composer Ellen Fullman

Ellen Fullman

Ellen Fullman is a composer, instrument builder, and performer. She was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and is currently based in the San Francisco Bay Area...

: the long string instrument

Long string instrument

The long string instrument is an instrument where the string is of such a length that the fundamental transverse wave is below what we can hear as a tone . If the tension and the length result in sounds with such a frequency the tone becomes a beating frequency ranging from a short reverb to...

. The long string instrument is a series of strands stretched over 90 feet that are played by being rubbed with rosin

Rosin

.Rosin, also called colophony or Greek pitch , is a solid form of resin obtained from pines and some other plants, mostly conifers, produced by heating fresh liquid resin to vaporize the volatile liquid terpene components. It is semi-transparent and varies in color from yellow to black...

covered hands while the player walks the length of the instrument. Fullman began development of the instrument in 1981. Fullman is not the only person who has built long string instruments. Since 1983, in addition to his work on and about the violin, Jon Rose

Jon Rose

Jon Rose is an Australian violinist born in the UK in 1951. Rose began playing violin at age 7 after winning a music scholarship to King's School in Rochester. For over 35 years, Rose has been at the sharp end of new, improvised, and experimental music and media...

has been bowing and recording the music of fence

Fence

A fence is a freestanding structure designed to restrict or prevent movement across a boundary. It is generally distinguished from a wall by the lightness of its construction: a wall is usually restricted to such barriers made from solid brick or concrete, blocking vision as well as passage .Fences...

s worldwide. Paul Panhuysen

Paul Panhuysen

Paul Panhuysen is a Dutch composer, visual and sound artist. He founded and directed Het Apollohuis, an art space that functioned during the 80's and 90's having artists doing sound installations, sound sculptures, and concerts about free improvisation, experimental music, and electronic...

made large sound installation

Sound installation

Sound installation is an intermedia and time based art form. It is an expansion of an art installation in the sense that it includes the sound element and therefore the time element...

s with groups of long strings. Also Yuri Landman built a portable 25 meter long string instrument called the Landmine.

Plucked instruments

Bowed instruments

Other

See also