MY (BACK TO BASICS) BANJO

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My banjo's neck was the result of a bit of "by guess and by gosh" figuring. I first drilled two holes near the to-be-covered edge of the head, and opposite each other, that were big enough to let me insert a length of hoe handle (it protruded about one inch on one side of the barrel section and six inches on the other) to function as a stem on which the neck could be fastened.

I constructed the "fretless fretboard" itself out of a planed-down Louisville Slugger brand baseball bat . . . although later versions, including those shown in the photos, started out as pickaxe handles. One end of the neck was shaped to fit the curve of the head, and angled in such a way that the strings would run roughly parallel to the flattened bat surface. Then the neck was attached to the Stem with screws and glue, and another threaded fastener was run through the keg and into the bat to secure the fingerboard to the head itself.

My remaining tasks were to shape the openings for the tuning pegs (as shown in the accompanying photo), add a bone "nut" below them, stretch on (and dry) the cowhide, bend a coat hanger to make a tailpiece, and sand down some pieces of 5/16" dowel until they had the right taper to be used as pegs. (The peg assemblies on my later banjos, including those illustrated, are a little fancier than were the ones in my prototype . . . but even the improved friction pegs sometimes work in a hit-or-miss, though still acceptable, fashion.) And that's all there was to building my own tunemaker. I bought a bridge and some strings and began making music!

I've made a few other funky banjos since that first successful experiment: Some have frets set into the neck, others are the five-string style, and one of my favorites follows the pattern of construction detailed above but has a head which is actually a bottomless clay bowl that I threw on my potter's wheel. And every one of them has brought me (and, I like to think, some of the folks around me) pleasure.

Of course, my story may not tell you all you need to know to put together a jury-rigged musicmaker of your own (after all, perhaps a banjo isn't even what you have in mind). However, if you first check your local library for books containing specific information on construction, maybe my experience can be a bit of an inspiration to you.

Just keep in mind that your goal is to "make your own kind of music" anyway . . . so why should you let the dream be limited to the confines of somebody else's idea of how your instrument should look?

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