With all of the wood that is being added to the treasure trove, finding the perfect sound and look for your next custom bowed psaltery will be as easy as ABC. Or should I say, Ash, Bubinga, and Chechen! The pictures above are: Curly Ash, Flamed Bubinga, and Figured Chechen; all of which are available for immediate use on a custom bowed psaltery in the Treasure Trove.
For this custom bowed psaltery, I just couldn’t resist taking a few pictures. There were just too many details. The first picture is of the top, which is made of Honduran Mahogany and also has a circular inlay of Musk Burl, which can be seen a little clearer in a previous post. The binding and bridge are made of Verawood, with the note markers of Tiger’s Eye and Black Onyx cabochons.
The next picture is of the four-piece Cocobolo back. I had written about the creation of this interesting back in another previous post. The overall shape and play of colors is intriguing, and the figure found in the sapwood is interesting as well. It’s amazing how a piece of wood that was initially too small for much of anything useful was turned into one of the primary features of the bowed psaltery.
Last of all, here is a closer picture of the Cocobolo sapwood mentioned above, along with one final feature that is unique to this psaltery: a pair of inlaid Ammonite shell halves in each of the two side corners. (Only one is visible in picture.)
Every once in a while, I get stuck on only finishing or stringing psalteries, and if I keep at it too long, it starts to get a little too tedious. Today was just such a day, and I knew that somehow, I needed to make some serious sawdust.
So, I decided to tap into my lumber supply, and start sawing up some of the boards in my collection to be put into the Treasure Trove – destined to become parts of a bowed psaltery someday.
To the left you can see one such board: a piece of quartersawn, curly and spalted Mango – to be used as soundboards. Basically, resawing a board involves cutting a board down its length, with its side standing up on edge. This results in getting a sequence of thinner boards that all look virtually identical, which can then be bookmatched to form either tops or backs of bowed psalteries.
Look for a lot of exciting and eye-popping wood to be added to the Treasure Trove in the next week or two. Soon will be a very good time to place a special order and get your first pick on the new pieces!
I took this picture while I was in the middle of stringing a bowed psaltery. With ball-end strings, this is a fairly straight-forward affair. All the tools that are needed are a needle-nose pliers and a tuner. I also use a contact mic clipped somewhere onto the psaltery to increase the tuner’s response and accuracy.
Also, I really like using an extra long T-handle tuning wrench for winding the string on the pins and for the initial tuning. The extra leverage reduces stress on the wrist, and generally makes things go smoother.
I’ve finally got the chance to use some incredibly figured Canarywood for a bowed psaltery. I had listed a couple of back/side sets in the Treasure Trove several months ago, and was surprised that no one had yet chosen to use them on a custom psaltery. (Though several people had expressed interest.)
In the above picture you can see this Canarywood, with a great example of bookmatching on the back. It almost resembles a flame, in both shape and color. There is still no binding yet, (which will be Snakewood), so the figure will look even more pronounced once it is framed and bordered with darker wood.
