2010-11-06

Dad's Baritone Uke is my Great grandfather's Tenor Guitar

I took a bunch of old Ukulele's out of Mom's basement to see what kind of shape they were in about 6 months ago.  Thought it would be funt to try and learn to play like my Dad!

Most looked and felt pretty cheap - and that's fair because I think he just bought a cheap one if he was on holidays and was going to a party!

There were  3 Baritone Uke's,  2 Concert Uke's (Alto) and 2 Soprano Uke's just gathering dust, so I decided that something needed to be done!  I took 5 Uke's into "Real Instruments" in Charlottetown. We tossed two because they were broken beyond their worth.

However  - We "build" a  bridge for one of the Soprano's for Krista and Mira and purchased a new bridge for the Raven Baritone Uke.

But the big news, to me, was that the other Baritone Ukulele was in fact a Tenor Guitar. I asked Mom and Cousin Craig and they both seemed to indicate that they thought it came from Craigs Grandpa; That'd be Dad's Grampa too - for those of you "familiarly" challenged. :-)

Any whoo...  It was in pretty bad shape - I didn't want it "restored" but playable if possible.
Real Instruments was great!
He injected some "epoxy" into the extremely thin parts where the strum wear was excessive and added some material with a thin piece of spruce. The fret's were cleaned up as best as possible, the plethora of cracks were repaired and inside the body the supports were re-adhered as they were completely unglued.

The "look" of the instrument is as it was when I brought it in so it still looks like hell, but Wow... we put some steel strings on it and what resonance. It's got a beautiful sound.

Wish I could play better RIGHT NOW!

I found some history on Raven Tenor Guitars and it looks like this one might have been built c.1925/30.
This time line would make sense, if it was given to Dad around 1950 - when he was 16 and it was 25.

Anyway...
Here are some pics! Hope I have some songs to share someday.

2 comments:

  1. What a beautiful guitar, Grant. I'd love to hear you play it some time. How are your fingertips? -Nick

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  2. Hey Nick,
    I can't play for beans... My poor old Piano chord learning and single note Flute training makes the transition to "4 strings" really hard.

    And years of mousing have caused my stubby fingers to no stretch! :-)

    It's fun though!

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