bachelorb
Cowboy Chord Virtuoso
One of my lots in life has been this thing called congenital mirror movement disorder. It's a fancy name for saying that if I make a fist with my right hand, my left hand will try to do that too. It's never been a big deal except for two things.... typing.....and playing guitar....
So after spending a frustrating year and a half trying to play and ready to quit the dang thing, a friend suggested a tenor guitar. Well that worked out extremely well!! I could control my left hand better with not as many fingers to move and by the tender age of 50, I was starting to have fun playing.
One of the problems though with a tenor is the the thin sound from the lack of bass notes, so I decided to tinker and this is what I came up with.
I ended up octaving the D and G strings similar to a twelve string. The problem with doing that is I have to modify the bridge. Here's the one I did yesterday. It was an old top load Ovation Applause that is going to be the one that gets banged around in the camper.
The other thing I did was try to spread out the strings on the neck similar to a mandocello or bouzouki. This also seemed to help me with my coordination problem,
When I was trying to figure this all out, I used an old epiphone 12 string as a prototype to figure all this out and get the string spacing right. I ended up having to slot the saddle to keep the strings in place, but it also allowed me to double up on the B and high E strings. So far I've done 2 twelve strings 3 six strings and a squire strat like this with mixed results. Intonation is really bad on the strat. I'm thinking of going to a 12 string bridge.
The problem with doing 6 strings is they have to stay like this and have no resale value (...and yes, I've even done a <gasp> Martin). The twelve string all I have to do is replace the saddle. I am thinking about trying a twelve string with a trapeze to see if I can minimize the guitar modification further.
I am open to any suggestions. I've been playing on this configuration for about three years now and really like it. I guess getting repeatability is what I'm after....
So after spending a frustrating year and a half trying to play and ready to quit the dang thing, a friend suggested a tenor guitar. Well that worked out extremely well!! I could control my left hand better with not as many fingers to move and by the tender age of 50, I was starting to have fun playing.
One of the problems though with a tenor is the the thin sound from the lack of bass notes, so I decided to tinker and this is what I came up with.
I ended up octaving the D and G strings similar to a twelve string. The problem with doing that is I have to modify the bridge. Here's the one I did yesterday. It was an old top load Ovation Applause that is going to be the one that gets banged around in the camper.
The other thing I did was try to spread out the strings on the neck similar to a mandocello or bouzouki. This also seemed to help me with my coordination problem,
When I was trying to figure this all out, I used an old epiphone 12 string as a prototype to figure all this out and get the string spacing right. I ended up having to slot the saddle to keep the strings in place, but it also allowed me to double up on the B and high E strings. So far I've done 2 twelve strings 3 six strings and a squire strat like this with mixed results. Intonation is really bad on the strat. I'm thinking of going to a 12 string bridge.
The problem with doing 6 strings is they have to stay like this and have no resale value (...and yes, I've even done a <gasp> Martin). The twelve string all I have to do is replace the saddle. I am thinking about trying a twelve string with a trapeze to see if I can minimize the guitar modification further.
I am open to any suggestions. I've been playing on this configuration for about three years now and really like it. I guess getting repeatability is what I'm after....