roldo's Page

Thanks. I'll have to look at the Lanikais too; they're pretty popular it seems. One reviewer I found on the Musician's Friend Web site mentioned being inspired by hearing "5 Years Time" by Noah & the Whale, so I found it on YouTube, and now I'm more inspired too. Cute song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8YCSJpF4g4
Thanks for your help. If I get one I'll let you know, though it probably won't be right away.
Walt

Roldo,
Happy New Year to you too! Thanks for encouraging my interest a little more, at least to the point that I went to Wikipedia to find out how it got its name. Interesting. Maybe I'll have to get to a store and play around with a couple of them. I don't have any friends who have them; they're all strictly guitar, mandolin and fiddle folks. (My Little Martin LX1 almost sounds like a uke, but I chose it as my travel guitar mostly because it sounded less like a uke and more like a guitar than all the other travel guitars I tried in my price range.) Do you think it matters much which body size to start with, e.g., standard, concert, tenor, soprano, etc.? Or is it mainly what sounds good to you?
Walt

Roldo,
I just listened to your three uke pieces in the Ukulele Players Group. Very nice. I haven't joined that group since I don't have or play a uke, but I'm starting to get interested because it seems like it might be fun. But I don't want to divert myself too much from time to practice the guitar at which I'm still a new player. Anyway, having not heard much ukulele playing since Arthur Godfrey days except for more Hawiian stuff, which I don't care for, I was surprised at how much yours sounded like a soft banjo. A good sound. Is it your instrument or your style, or is it just that I haven't been paying attention!?
Walt

Yea, one of my attempts at building an old mountian dulcimer. I gave it to a neighbor kid who plays the thing a whole lot better than I ever could.

Yup, she's all original and still plays great. Neck is dead straight. When I got it, the back was wanting to separate at the top treble side. I thought it might need to re-set the neck which I didn’t want to tackle nor did anyone else I asked. Instead, I built a pitiful looking jig with a crank, turned it a touch each day for 10 days till it came back right, pushed in some glue and it's been golden.
Good story about how I got it. I was on a plane reading Vintage Guitar and a guy behind me, in his 60's, saw it and told me he had an old guitar and had no idea what it was. His grandfather worked at Gibson and gave it to him as s kid but he didn't play so it had been in his closet. I asked if it was electric or acoustic and he didn't know. I asked if had F-holes or a round sound hole and he said neither, that it was sorta oval. I had no idea, but told him I'd have a look if he wanted to stop by. We exchanged numbers and a few months later he walked in to my shop with it wrapped in a bed sheet. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it. He had no use for it and wanted to buy a new washing machine. I warned him it could be a bad trade depending on if the back could be sorted out or not but he insisted and the rest is history. Meant to be.
How did you come across yours Roldo?

Thank you Roldo! Cool on the Kalamazoo - the LG-2 is the same age as me although some days I feel as old as the O! There is a wonderful guy in town here who worked at Gibson and now does a bluegrass radio show on the local NPR station WMUK named Mark Sahlgren. He is a great but modest Gibson historian and has a black Style O. I'll see if I can find his email address, he'd love to see your guitar. I'm not sure what the heck I'm posting where here, half being new, half being technically challenged, but I'll try to get to more pics up.

Hey, come join the Gibson acoutsic group I started!
http://acousticguitarclub.ning.com/group/gibsonacousticowners
Edward

Hey Roldo, check out Jim's Hard Times here on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEvT54JudrY

Stick with it. I think you'll enjoy it.

Also, the Transatlantic Sessions version, possibly the very best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YrfLnlrquo

Thanks for listening.

Thanks for the comment and heads up. Listened to his piano/vocal version and agree it's very authentic. Have you listened to Jim Ohlschmidt's version? Also authentic, but fingerstyle guitar.