24 Stringed Grandfather

This instrument was built mostly from materials that I recovered from a job site that I was working on. The head stock which is to the right was originally part of a broken mirror frame that I found in the basement of Mitzi's Cafe. I cut it down to fit the width of the instrument, but made no attempt at changing the color of stain. Part of the joy in building these instruments out of garbage and what not, is the challenge of finding different things that work well together; with as few alterations as possible. Other parts of the mirror also went into building the Harp Bass, and Tony's Bass. The idea for building the 24 Stringed Grandfather was loosely based on the hammer dulcimer. What I did with the strings is quite different though. The first eight strings are set up the same as any of the MV series.The next six strings which are all raised up slightly higher are set as individually tuned drone strings, or you could also use a slide. The last eight strings are set up to be played like the Larcksichord, which you can read more about further down the page. In an attempt to waste little of the salvaged materials I use the base was made from the remaining parts of the mirror frame. One of the main problems with this instrument is it's ability to be tuned. The first obvious problem is that half of the tuning pegs actually sit just below the strings, so it can be very difficult, almost to the point of annoying to get your stubby fingers in there. The second problem which is a bit more of a pain is the fact that the wood where the strings are fed into near the head stock sits about an inch and a half lower than the tuning pegs. This causes a lot of tension, and prevents easy movement between the two, therefore making it difficult to get proper tension on the strings. I will be working on this problem soon. How though, I'm not that sure.

The 24 Stringed Grandfather was first shown at Mitzi's Sister in Parkdale. It hung for the month of March 2005.
The show was called Delinquente Strumenti.