NIGW

[gilaltom3]

New Instrument Gas Week.

Have you guys heard of a bouzouki? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouzouki

They have an Irish night at Wake the Dead in San Marcos (every other Thursday or something of the sort) and a friend of a friend built himself one of these and he hadn't quite learned how to play it, so I picked it up for a few songs and played along. I'm gassing really hard for one now.



I've been wanting to tell him to make me one for a week or two.

You guys ever pick up a random instrument and decide you love it?

[Jessie's ghost]

[gilaltom3]

Everyone on this forum has the best link responses I've ever seen.

Well done.

[crusty philtrum]

I'm more familiar with the bouzouki in the context of Greek music, and they usually seemed to use bowl-back bodies. Way back, all the local music shops would have bouzoukis, but they were always cheap, and they felt and sounded that way. I remember thinking it would be good to hear a top-of-the-range one because they'd probably sound much richer.

I've owned this Tiple for about thirty years. I heard them and about them through Ry Cooder and his 70s recordings, then i saw this one in a music shop on a visit to Melbourne (I lived in Sydney at that time) and I had to have it. It's a copy of a Martin tiple, and apparently the Martin was a 1919 re-design of the traditional South American styles.

(from Wiki....)

" Modern versions ; American tiple

The tiple was redesigned in 1919 by the American guitar company C.F. Martin & Co. for the William J. Smith Co. in New York. This tiple -- generally pronounced "tipple" -- has ten steel strings in four courses, tuned similarly to a D-tuned ukulele: AadDdf#F#f#BB. Many similar instruments were developed by other companies around the same time.

Tiple strings and tuning: A ukulele-style tuning can be used (this is the original) or the tiple can be tuned like a guitar.

Electric Tiples

Electric Tiples that have been designed usually follow the Colombian or Martin tuning and string arrangement. "



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiple

[gilaltom3]

Yeah the one I played was bowl backed.

[KeeperOS]

Being Greek I am pretty familiar with them. AFAIK, unlike guitars, you won't find a company that builds top-of-the-line production ones, they are to this day mostly built by hand in small shops, the better ones on customer's order.

The one in the OP isn't a bouzouki like the ones I'm used to, not sure what exactly it is.
This is more like one:

All of them bowl backed, I think with either 4 or 3 strings (or rather, 8 and 6 but in pairs). Don't play much like a guitar.
Never really a fan of them to be honest...