Deciding on an Instrument

Our group met on October 23rd to discuss our options for which instrument to build. Each member of the group brought the research on his or her assigned instrument. From this information we created a list of pros and cons for each instrument. In this list we considered things such as how much time it would take to build the instrument, how much it would cost, what kind of materials were needed, and how much time the project would take.

We decided to build a cigar box guitar. It will be fairly inexpensive to make and is also very interesting in its design. We created a list of necessary items for building this instrument:

guitar strings
tuners
cigar box
wood for the neck
sandpaper
screws
wood glue
drill/screw driver

At our next meeting we will begin construction of the cigar box guitar.

Meeting with Mark

Yesterday we met with Mark Sisson to ask for suggestions for building our guitar. Rather than get into specifics about the guitar, he actually gave us a few other ideas for what kind of chordophone to make. We brainstormed for other ideas and designs and came up with the styrofoam guitar, cigar box guitar, spike fiddle, hammered dulcimer, and a Japanese instrument called the koto. In order to find which will be the cheapest and easiest to make, our group decided it would be best if we researched each instrument. An instrument was assigned to each person to research. Each member is going to try and think about the materials that could be used in building the instrument and how the building process would even take place. Mark told us about a website that he uses to buy tuners and other products and suggested we check it out. At our next group meeting we will discuss what each member found in his or her research.