Wax Cylinder Recording

For Immediate Release-
How Lo-Fi Can You Go? Aaron Keim Releases CD of Wax Cylinder Recordings

Aaron Keim, multi-instrumentalist and founding member of Boulder Acoustic Society, is known for his old timey music taste and indie approach to the music business. At last year's Folk Alliance Conference in Memphis, he met Martin Fisher who is a sound archivist and recording technician. Martin was recording musicians at the conference on a turn of the century wax cylinder recorder. Aaron got out his guitar and ukulele, sat down in front of the recording horn and turned out 5 tracks.

Invented by Thomas Edison in 1877, the wax cylinder phonograph was the first commercial recording and playback device and was popular into the 1910's when disc shaped records forced them out of business. If you think a 78rpm record sounds old and scratchy, wait till you hear the lo-fi glory of wax cylinder recordings. To make these non-electrical recordings, the musician sings into a large horn, which guides a needle as it digs into the wax cylinder. Aaron transferred his wax recordings to CD and is releasing them as The Quiet American.

For this EP Aaron recorded three original indie-folk songs and two traditional songs. This includes help from Boulder Acoustic Society on Ruben's Train. You can see them recording in front of the wax recording machine at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOlH6YZZfjM. Also, included on the CD is a digital version of the song The Light The Dust, which was recorded at the same time as the wax version.

To celebrate this release, Aaron is squeezing two shows around Boulder Acoustic Society's busy schedule. Oskar Blues in Lyons on May 2nd and the Mercury Cafe in Denver on April 30th.


To hear a sample, check out www.myspace.com/aaronckeim and click on "Rove Riley Rove."
To Purchase, go to http://www.etsy.com/shop/LazarusBooks

Clawhammer Ukulele Lesson Vol. 3

New Video by Rosco

Check out this great video our friend Rosco made of my band playing Ruben's Train!

Oahu Lap Slide Project!

When I was working on my master's degree, I wrote a thesis project about the Oahu Conservatory of Music, which sold sheet music, lessons and instruments (mostly lap slide guitars) during the depression. They sold most of this stuff through the mail, which helped spread slide guitar all over the world and planted the seeds for dobro, electric lap steel, pedal steel and more. This paper was published in The Fretboard Journal and I also gave a lecture on it at University of Oregon.

Anyway, their cheapest instruments, which were probably made by Kay and Regal, are solid birch and built like tanks. I have owned one of their super fancy mahogany jumbo models but recently sold it. I have one of their electric guitars from the 1950's, but I have been meaning to get one of the cheap ones for an experiment.

First, I got this one off of Ebay for around $50. It had no tuners and several cracks and loose braces. It is OO size with a 24 inch playing scale. The bridge is cast aluminum and the whole thing is birch with a square neck.

Next, I glued up all the cracks, made a bone nut and set it up with the same string set I use for all my electric lap steels. 13-56 nickel strings where I move 2nd to 1st and replace 2nd with an .018 unwound string.

I harvested a single coil pickup, volume knob and tone knob from Leighton's old guitar, got a soldering iron and a book of schematics and went for it!






I put a couple of scraps in the sound hole to mount the pickup. I can use the screw to raise and lower the pickup. I drilled three holes through the top and mounted the rest of the hardware. The tuners came from the project box, and are re-pros of the old three on a plate Kluson tuners.



Lastly, I tuned it up to DADF#AD and gave it a whirl through the amp. It sounds great and puts out about 85% of what my electric does, which is just great. It has more sustain than a reso and less than an electric. Perfect. Also, I am out around $70 for the whole thing!



Oh yeah, I found another bug in the instrument, this time a Japanese beetle. This has happened twice in the last week!

A couple of Ebay Auctions

#1 A tin can ukulele!

This is not just a cheap neck stuck to a can or cigar box, this is a new mahogany and walnut neck made to fit this instrument. The body is an italian espresso can with a mahogany bridge. Aquila strings, soprano scale and gotoh tuners. How does it sound? Well kind of like a ukulele made out of a tin can! I will post a youtube video for all the curious out there so you know what you are getting.




Great playability, unique look and sound. You know your collection is missing this!

#2 A Vintage Reed Ukulele (thanks to Antebellum Instruments for an introduction to this brand)

A bug in my ukulele!

I have restored a lot of old instruments over the years, and I often find weird stuff inside of them. Pencils, gum wrapers, beer tops, huge dustballs are the norm. Today I unwrapped an old ukulele for restoration that I got off ebay. I unpacked it, took it downstairs and started working on the bridge and saddle. a few minutes later, what did I see? A box elder bug crawling through the soundhole! Its not from here, because its winter in Colorado so its pretty much bugless. what a shock!

Re-built Soprano Uke- Chicago made?

Here is a soprano ukulele most likely made in Chicago in the 1920's. It is made of a beautiful flamed mahogany with a new walnut bridge and fingerboard. It has checkered rope binding and a mahogany neck with new tuners and aquila strings.


Here is the deal: I bought this uke in pieces and it needed major work. I essentially re-built it from the inside out. It has a great sparkly vintage sound but with modern playability and nice sustain and volume for such a small body. When you look close you will see the evidence of all the small repairs needed to get this uke solid again. Despite these small aesthetic issues, the uke is rock solid and a dependable player.


Here is what I did:
-repaired and patched back and front cracks
-re-braced the entire instrument with cedar bracing and added a cedar bridge patch
-added new kerfed linings
-patched small holes and gaps with mahogany and did my best to keep as much old binding as possible
-pulled the old frets and added a mahogany veneer to the neck to make it straight
-added new walnut fingerboard, bridge, saddle and nut
-new tuners and strings
-re-finished with a light oil finish


It's on ebay