Babbling

news. music. players. instruments.

issue 1 spring 2012

I am intrigued as to whether agreat guitar can be made frommaterials and hardware thathaven’t travelled half wayround the globe to get here...

Going native

Welcome......to the first edition of‘Babbling Brook’, our newonline magazine for allthings ‘Brook Guitars’!

We’ve been handcraftingguitars and other frettedinstruments in rural Devonsince 1995.

So, first and foremost,we’d like to share with youthe passion we have forthe work we do, as well asintroducing you to someof the many customersand friends we’ve madeover the years.

We’ll be featuring some ofthe custom orders we’vebuilt – Rob Jessep’s finebaritone Tavy (left), forexample – as well asmeeting some of the folk,past and present, who’vebought and play ourinstruments.

We’re also going to take alook at some of thematerials that go into ourguitars, their tonalcharacteristics, andhopefully offer you aninsight into the way we dothings here atEasterbrook.

As ever, we value youropinion, so if you’d like totell us what you think of‘Babbling Brook’, have anyideas on what you’d like tosee in a future issue – orfancy discussing your ‘nextguitar’! – we’d love to hearfrom you.

Cheers...

Simon and AndyFounders, Brook Guitars

For several months I’d beenintrigued by a certain thought:‘Is it possible to build a guitar from

home-grown materials?’

I guess the vast majority of guitarists don’treally worry about where the materials fortheir guitars come from. Indeed, look inany guitar shop, or on guitar companywebsite, and I bet the vast majority ofguitars are made of spruce with eitherrosewood or mahogany.

Almost certainly, the fingerboards andbridges would be made of eitherrosewood or ebony. And have you everthought where that lovely-lookingabalone or pearl comes from? Probablynot from anywhere near these shores.

Most guitarists would not be troubled bythese things. In fact, I’m not sure it reallytroubles me to any great extent – but IAM intrigued as to whether a great guitar

can be made from materials andhardware that haven’t travelled half wayround the globe to get here.

I had, until very recently, a very fineguitar by another well known Englishmaker, whose name shall remainanonymous. It was a lovely looking andsounding instrument. But, was it actuallyEnglish? The top was a fine piece ofEngelmann spruce, the back and sideslovely straight grained Indian Rosewood,fingerboard of ebony, absolutelywonderful Gotoh tuners. Even its innards(braces and linings) were probablymahogany and spruce.

None of these materials came from thiscountry, and probably from nowhere inthe northern hemisphere. I am notparticularly what you call an ‘ethicalconsumer’. Yes, I do try to buy vegetablesthat are in season, and hopefully thathave been grown in this country (themost bizarre thing I ever saw in asupermarket was asparagus that hadcome from Thailand, in the season whenEnglish asparagus is at its best – but Idigress!) But it did niggle me at theamount of airmiles that my guitar hadclocked up. The only English thing aboutthat guitar was its case!

Earlier in the year I took a visit to therather wonderful guitar emporium that is

Brook owner Rob Jessep chronicles a custom build project with a distinctly home-grown theme

continued on page 2

Photograph courtesy of Leon Palmer

page 2 www.brookguitars.com

Going native

wood tones

Yew is a very slowgrowing small/mediumevergreen attainingheights of 28m and atrunk diameter of up to4m. Some stands inScotland are estimated tobe approximately 2,000years old.

The Yew has beenexploited throughouthistory for its timber. Inthe MiddleAges, it wasextensively harvested forbowstaves.

The colour of yew rangesfrom pale brown to purplein the heartwood and acreamy white in thesapwood. The grainpatterns are quite strikingas this is a softwood,being evergreen, althoughit has a density higherthan many hardwoods.

Tonally, it has a maple-likeclarity but with verysweet, intimate andappealing overtones.

Oasis Music in Ringwood. There, aftermany hours spent playing some fineinstruments, I bought a wonderful newguitar – a Brook Tamar with EuropeanSpruce top and Wild Cherry (a wonderfultonewood that Brook really rate, locallygrown within a few miles of theirworkshop) back and sides. A couple ofvisits down to the Brook workshop thenset me off on my road to commissioning arather special instrument

On the occasion of my first visit acustomer had come in to pick up a ratherbeautiful Taw, which had a walnut neckand 3,000 year-old bog oak in place ofebony for the fingerboard, bridge andfaceplate. Up to that point, I hadn’t beenaware of any alternatives to using ebonyor rosewood for fingerboards (ruling outmaple of course, which is rarely seen onan acoustic). This got me thinking – sincebog oak is basically a home grownalternative to ebony (and I don’t know ofmuch ebony that grows in the UK orEurope) would it then be possible tocreate an instrument using totally homegrown woods?

The short answer to the question was no– as Simon later explained, English spruceis really not suitable for guitar tops. So let’srefine the question: “Is it possible to makea guitar from European materials and thuskeeping the air miles down as far aspossible?”

Over the next few weeks I continued toponder this question, formulating in mymind what such a guitar would look like.Options for back and sides were fairly clear– there is yew, cherry, of course, even

walnut (such as the rather wonderfulKew Gardens walnut that has been usedby a few makers, including Brook, justlately). Brook already uses a lot ofEuropean spruce for tops (an option theydon’t charge for, despite many makerspiling on the premium for such an option).

On my second visit down to Brook tohave a tweak of my Tamar’s setup, I wentwith my wife and we had an enjoyablestay overnight in one of the excellentB&Bs that are linked on the Brookwebsite. That evening, after our visit tothe workshop to see many wonderfulguitars in various stages of construction,we got on to the subject ofcommissioning an instrument (I think mywife, who is not a guitar player, was justas excited by the workshop as I was) and,based on some guitars we had seen thatday, started to sketch out a possible spec:

European spruce topYew back and sidesSycamore/ walnut and cherry laminated neckBog oak fingerboard, bridge and faceplate

On our second day we turned up at theworkshop, the guys expecting me to justpick up my Tamar from having its setup.We then put forward our proposedinstrument. To the credit of the Brookboys, when I mentioned my ‘nativetheme’ to them they were not fazed inany way, as they had worked on similarprojects before, but maybe not acompletely ‘European’ guitar. I felt theimportant thing was if this was going to

Rob Jessep and wife Catherine select his Yew set – and the build gets underway

continued on page 5

from page 1

English YewScientific name: Taxus baccataUses: Back & sides, drop tops,veneer

Photograph courtesy of Leon Palmer

www.brookguitars.com page 3

The road to EasterbrookThe idyllic setting of the Brook Guitars workshop deep in the heart of the Devonshire countryside

‘The Prof and Pethers’, as Simon (left) and Andy were christened by their mentor,Andy Manson, and (left) Simon’s scale drawings of some of the Brook range

Set the ‘sat nav’, negotiate miles ofwinding, narrow country lanes, and– at the end of a rough, single-trackfarm road – you’ll find Brook Guitars.

The road to Easterbrook, however, wasrather more straightforward for companyfounders Andy Petherick and SimonSmidmore: a direct route from one of theUK’s most respected luthiers...

Back in the early 1990s, Andy and Simonwere both pursuing very differentcareers, as a car mechanic and a builderrespectively.

But, as with so many great partnerships,fate conspired to bring them both to theattention of guitar maker Andy Manson,at a very opportune time.

He recalls: “Andy used to fix up my oldbangers and Simon was working on ahouse next to where I was living andworking in Devon. It wasn’t long beforeSimon and I were having joint coffeebreaks and sharing guitar talk.

“I soon came to know Simon’s talents asan artist and an interesting picker, with afair bit of experience fixing guitars and

continued on page 4

page 4 www.brookguitars.com

The road to Easterbrook

Brook Guitars: (From left) Andy, Simon, Jack, Kev and Andy

from page 3

“Stuart, in particular, has probably been responsible forselling more guitars than anyone else for us, throughhis workshops,” said Simon.

Easterbrook’s output is approximately 100 instrumentsper year, in batches of five or six at a time.

“Our aim is to build the best guitars available anywhere,at a price the general public can afford,” said Andy.

“We’re constantly looking to improve what we do, andto keep the workshop as a bullshit-free zone – becausethere’s so much of it talked in our line of work!”

Added Simon: “It’s also gratifying that we have so manyrepeat customers coming back to us, which tells uswe’re hopefully doing something right.”

his obsessively-collected ukuleles.

“An opportunity of investment and expansion of myworkshop arose. While preparing a batch of guitars toshow at Frankfurt to promote the expansion, Andyapplied his engineering skills to building a polishingmachine for me, and happened to drop in ‘...and if youever need someone in the workshop, I’d love to have cleanhands for a change’.”

Andy Manson had already established himself as one ofthe UK’s top luthiers, with a client base that includedLed Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones, Andy Summers, and IanAnderson and Martin Barre, of Jethro Tull.

He continued: “Came the question of extra hands in thenew venture. The obvious candidates were staring mein the face: an artist/crafstman/guitar picker and anengineer. So, between us we tore into the wholeproject of equipping a new large workshop.

“It really didn't take long for Andy and Simon to take totheir new lives, learning the principles and method ofluthiery. We split the tasks, in view of the wealth ofskills each of them brought to the bench. Andy was anexperienced cellulose sprayer, so that was naturally hisdomain; Simon became quickly adept at side bending.And I think I did most of the neck carving.”

In his book, ‘Talking Wood’ (Pub. Great Britain 1998, R&DAssociates, Exeter, Devon – currently out of print), Mansonhas, by now, christened Simon and Andy ‘The Prof andPethers’ – and as early as page 29, also refers to them as‘Brook Guitars’, following their work on an instrumentfor a customer in Sound City, Japan.

He said: “We had a pretty smooth operation going on,selling to the trade, quite a few to Germany, Hollandand Belgium. America took quite a lot too. Simon’s son(Jack) came and joined us, the workshop was busy andproductive.

“The guys regularly spoke of how they loved the work –and Andy’s hands were clean! It was a greatdemonstration of the whole being greater than the

(Manson) was a very good teacher who basically justpushed us both in at the deep end.

sum of the parts – a grouping of variedskills, experience and ideas.

“Then, things happened in my personallife, I decided to withdraw and, sinceAndy and Simon were by this timethoroughly competent to continue ontheir own, I went on to work solo...”

Simon takes up the story: “Andy

“We started off with fairly straightforward jobs, likefretting, but learned to do everything from the start,and obviously played to our own particular skills andstrengths, which is how it is today.”

Andy and Simon agreed to take on the Easterbrookworkshop – a 300-year-old timbered building that onceserved as a cowshed for the adjacent farm – and BrookGuitars was born in the spring of 1995.

“Originally, we planned to make guitars on licence to AndyManson, but our own designs really took over,” said Andy.

With the encouragement of Andy Manson, Brookdesigned their own series of guitars – the Taw, Torridgeand Bovey were the first models – all named after themany rivers that flow through the West Country, andadditional designs and an infinite number of custom-order variations have since followed.

Simon estimates that today, business is divided roughly50-50, between shop sales from Brook dealerships –Celtic Chords in Scotland; Intersound in Gloucestershire;Guitar Classics and Ivor Mairants in London; Oasis inHampshire; and The Acoustic Music Company (TAMCO)in Brighton – and custom orders.

But, like Andy Manson, they are not without their ownfair share of high profile players too, including theaforementioned Ian Anderson, ‘techno-picker’ AdrianLegg, members of Portishead, Pete Berryman, StuartRyan (see page 8), Woody Mann, and many others.

But perhaps the final word should come from theman who set Andy and Simon on the road toEasterbrook – Andy Manson: “It’s very gratifying to seethe work Andy and Simon are doing. The design andexecution is as good as you’ll find anywhere.

“They’re producing a very valid offering to seriousplayers. They have their own definite style, based on‘classic’ steel string guitar principles and aesthetics.

“Their work is exemplary, and since their method hasevolved out of my way of doing things at that time, Ifeel a strong connection to their work, whilst my currentmethod has evolved in a different way.

“I’m seeing two possible routes forward from a point inthe past. Split infinities!”

www.brookguitars.com page 5

Every Brook I have ever playedhas been a great instrument,and I have no doubt that thisguitar will bring somethingmagical to the creative process!

Going nativework as a theme, then EVERYTHING wouldhave to be homegrown and European. So...

Tuners would have to be European andnot Japanese (this excluded my favouriteGotoh 510 tuners – instead we went forsome beautiful Swiss-made Schertlers);

All linings and braces would have to benative woods (no mahogany, for example– in the end the guys used tulip woodand poplar);

Position dots would have to be alsohome-grown (and ‘vegetarian’ – mostshell fish used in the decoration ofguitars comes from overseas, NewZealand, I believe).

I loved the sap wood stripe in the set ofyew I chose (see picture page 2), and theway the grain seemed to naturally followthe shape of the guitar. Simon chose anamazing set for the sides, again with sapwood that would hug the edge of thespruce top.

In the end the dots – the simplest of things– proved to be the trickiest to get right, andat one point I even felt like I ought tocompromise and use pearl or abalone, justto make everyone’s lives easier! The originalidea was to do without position markers on

the front of the fingerboard, and have sidedots that were Cornish Tin (Andy’s inspiredidea). Unfortunately, after research by Andythere doesn’t appear to be any native tin –the South Crofty mine, famous for its tintrinkets, actually import theirs!

A moment of inspiration struck, thanks to apost on the Acoustic Magazine Forum. Amember had just purchased a rather lovelymalt whisky cask Fylde mandolin, where theside dots, remarkably, were copper. So –problem solved: side dots made of recycledcopper, and not a shellfish sacrificed!

And there you have it, the start of what Ihope will be a truly great guitar. The shapewill be a Tavy, a small jumbo-sized guitar,with longer scale length (660mm) anddesigned for low C tunings such as C sus9.

This commission has taught me that it ISperfectly possible, with a little ingenuity, toproduce a genuine home grown/native/

truly European instrument.

Nothing seems to be too much effort forthose fabulous Brook luthiers, and there

are plenty of possibilities here for playerslooking for an ethically-made instrumentthat cuts down on the air miles (andthus, hopefully, the carbon footprint) andfor a vegetarian player who doesn’t likethe thought of shellfish sacrificed justso they can see where their fingers areon the fingerboard.

But have I sacrificed sound quality simplybecause of having different wood for thebracing and linings for example? Somehow,I don’t think so – every Brook I have everplayed has been a great instrument and Ihave no doubt that this guitar will bringsomething magical to the creative process. Ican’t wait to find out! Watch this space...

from page 2

Schertleropengeartuners, bogoak veneer,and an oak leafinlaid into abog oak trussrod cover

The baritone – or ‘longneck’ –guitar is a variation on thestandard instrument, with a

longer scale that allows it to betuned to a lower range.

Although it first appeared in therealms of classical music, during the1920s the Stella guitar company useda scale length of 26.4” for many of its12-string guitars, often tuned very low.

In the late 1950s, Danelectro was thefirst guitar maker to introduce theelectric baritone, which began tofeature in surf music, as well as moviesoundtracks, particularly ‘spaghettiwesterns’.

During the 70s, Joe Veillette workedwith Henry Citron to created a longscale guitar, initially electric bodied.Several builders then started offeringbaritone instruments, including RickTurner (who converted Martins andGibsons to baritones), Ovation andRalph Bown.

Today, many more guitar makers nowinclude the baritone option in theirstandard ‘production line’ ranges,while a host of independent luthiersoffer bespoke alternatives. Brook areno exception...

“Our first baritone was commissionedby a customer about 10 years ago,”said Simon.

“Since then, we’ve gone on tobuild about a dozen more. I

think Pat Metheny’s CD ‘One QuietNight’, where he used a baritonein a low ‘Nashville tuning’, was

probably quite influential inbringing the baritoneguitar to the fore.”

Night of the ‘longnecks’

Baritone guitars have never been more in vogue, with players such as Pat Metheny,Andy McKee and Ralph Towner all featuring their mellifluous tones on recent releases.But ‘lowering the tone’ of great guitar music has been no overnight sensation...

The nature of the baritone generallynecessitates a bigger body, and Brookusually recommend the Okement orTavy shapes for theirs.

“A common mistake people make is tothink that baritones need to be braceda lot more heavily, to take heavierstrings, but when they’re tuned up (or,more specifically, down!), the stringtension isn’t that different from anormal guitar,” explains Simon, ”so wetend to build them only fractionallyheavier.”

The longer scale (the distance from thenut to the saddle on the bridge) of thebaritone facilitates tunings muchlower than ‘standard’ – usually A to A(A D G C E A – a perfect fifth below

Surf’s up! A 1950sDanelectro Longhornbaritone

A Brook baritone Tavy outside theEasterbrook workshop, winter 2003

continued on page 6

page 6 www.brookguitars.com

Ididn’t see the guitar as a baritone atall when I first thought about it –rather, just with a slightly longer scale

to balance out the 12-fret design.

The idea came from an old dreadnoughtguitar that I have which has an Adirondacktop and Brazilian Rosewood back andsides. Only problem is that the guitar tendsto put my right shoulder out of joint if Iplay it for any length of time.

To me, 12 fretters have a different feel to 14fret guitars – they seem looser and have adifferent resonance, so that was an easydecision. The more pronounced waist on aTamar or Taw meant that the problemswith my shoulder wouldn’t occur andrather than having a wedge or a bevel, Ihad the guitar made shallower than anormal Tamar, which means it’s very comfyto play for long periods. Also, there wasenough wood to make a Tamar – so that’swhy a Tamar and not a Taw!

The Cocobolo came from Craft Supplies inthe Peak District. A long time ago, I hadthis thought of building a guitar fromscratch and the six pieces of wood were inthe bin end section at the workshop,having originally been bought to practicebending. When laid out they looked rathergood, so I thought they might make up a

set of back and sides at some point. Stillhaven’t started building anything yet, butyou never know!

The Adirondack came from the OldStandard Wood Company on Simon andAndy’s recommendation. It’s whereCollings get their Adirondack too!

The build was a standard Brook build andnothing out of the ordinary that I amaware of. There’s nothing elaborate aboutthe guitar – it’s just wonderfully made.It’s also got Waverly tuners, because theyseem to hold the note best and to me, forthat reason, they’re perfect for alteredtunings. They look good too!

My guitar sounds just like I hoped it would– there’s a lovely, bell-like quality to thenotes and endless sustain. Someone elseasked me what it sounded like and I said “itsounds like chocolate.” I hope that makessome sense!

I play a bit of mixture. Anything from late‘50s pop songs, some of my own stuff, andsome traditional English songs, andanything else that takes my fancy, a fewtunes, but mostly songs. One minorproblem is that the guitar is almost tooloud to sing against, so it’s now migratedto DADGAD from the originally intended Ctunings!

Night of the ‘longnecks’

standard), B to B (B E A D F# B – a perfectfourth lower), C to C (CF Bb Eb G C – amajor third lower), and other associatedlow C tunings – although Celticguitarist Tony McManus is known totune his Bill Kelday baritone to as lowas F to F (which is getting on foracoustic bass territory)!

On ‘One Quiet Night’ and his morerecent solo acoustic baritone offering,‘What’s It All About’, jazz luminary PatMetheny utilises the A D G C E A option– but with the third and fourth stringsrestrung and tuned an octave higherthan usual (the ‘Nashville tuning’previously referred to).

As Metheny himself puts it: “Basically,

from page 5

the guitar ends up being sort of likethree, parallel two-string guitars. It’ssort of got like a middle range guitaron the top, it’s got this high guitar inthe middle and this very low guitar inthe bottom. So I could think in termsof...three-quarters of a string quartet –and was able to kind of keep theselines going that would ultimately needto shift to this other octave, an octaveother than the way the lines wouldnormally go.”

An interesting recent variant onMetheny’s baritone ‘Nashville tuning’ isthe eight-string baritone currentlyoffered by Taylor, on which the thirdand fourth strings are doubled with anoctave string, as on a 12-string.

Another contributory factor to thecharacteristic sound a baritoneproduces is thought to be the positionof the bridge, which – thanks to thelonger scale of the instrument – ispushed further back down the lowerbout, to what many regard as the‘sweet spot’ (one reason, too, why 12-fretters can pack a punch belying theirsize).

What, then, about the woods used tohelp pump out the rich, deep tones ofthese wonderful guitars? Is there anideal ‘baritonewood’...?

Not according to Simon: “We’ve alwaysliked cherry – local, of course! – as atonewood generally, but we’ve built

baritones out of all sorts;mahogany, rosewood, walnut,cocobolo (see Dave Smith’sinterview, right) and one inlacewood for (Total Guitar/Guitarist columnist) Stuart Ryan(left).”

Why not take the time to checkout some of the players whohave embraced the uniquesound of the acoustic baritone– as, too, are an increasingnumber of Brook owners...

Lucy with her baritone Tavy, which joinedher standard scale custom Tavy

Stuart Ryan shows off thedecorative fleck pattern on the backof his lacewood baritone Tavy

A joint decision...Dave Smith describes how a shoulder problem was instrumental in his choice of Brook baritone

www.brookguitars.com page 7

continued on page 8

Just what the Doctor ordered...Mike Lydiat is the ‘Doc’ behind ‘Doc’s Workshop’, a comprehensive internetresource which showcases his definitive and exhaustive work intransposing more than 200 compositions by blind Irish harpist TurloughO’Carolan for guitar. Here, he shares his experience in commissioning acustom-order Okement from the Easterbrook workshop...

When I went to the Brook workshop to collect my Okement,early in May 2011, I said to Simon that it must be quite atense moment

when the strings go on.

Several months’ work is atstake and there is no wayto check tone and actionuntil that moment.Luckily, I have the photoof my first tentativestrums (left) and the smileon my face says it all:“That’s quite remarkable!”

I ordered the guitar inJanuary 2011 as a kind ofbirthday present, though Ihad to sell two others tofinance the deal. I haveplayed guitar for over 50years and have ownedsome 15 guitars in thattime, but only two havebeen brand new – a 1963 Fender Strat (what would THAT be worth now Iwonder?) and a Brook Tavy bought in 2001 from Mike Blair, who runs theBedford Folk Music Club and Bedroom Acoustic Music in Ampthill. But Ihad never defined the spec for a guitar and I was determined to do sothis time.

I wanted a mix from some of the excellent guitars I currently have: localcherry for the back and sides, like the neck of my Manson BluebirdSphinx; an ebony finger-plate, again similar to the Bluebird; an extrasound port like the Manson Sidehole I have; a cutaway, though I don't

(Above) ‘That’s quiteremarkable!’ Mike strumsthe first chords on his newOkement, and (right) someof the monthly photographsSimon emailed to him asthe build progressed

Mike (front) proudly sports his red Fender Strat inthe Sixties with Manchester-based The Paiges

In my opinion, Brook make some of the finestacoustic guitars the UK has to offer and evenbetter is that fact that Andy and Simon are suchwonderful guys to deal with.

Although their guitars definitely have a signaturesound (which is a good thing) it has always beenmy experience that they really know how to tailorthe instrument to the player.

My Torridge was my main recording andperformance guitar and featured exclusively on mysolo CD ‘The Coast Road’ and on many recordingsfor my columns for Guitar Techniques magazine.Amongst the many fine attributes of this guitarwere its bell-like clarity and ease of playability. Theformer made it an easy guitar to record, whilst thelatter made it an ideal performance instrument.

Fancying something completely different, I thenordered a lacewood baritone (tuned down a third),which again had that legendary Brook playabilitybut with a completely different flavour.

I’d suggest this kind of guitar to anyone who wantsto try something new – the low

tuning allowed for different ideasbut tuning a major third lowermeant that the sound never gotmushy.

All in all, great guitars built bygreat guys in an idyllic location –you can’t go wrong with a Brook!

Stuart Ryan’s name mayalready be familiar throughthe hundreds of articles andvideo lessons he has createdfor Guitar Techniques, TotalGuitar and Guitaristmagazines.

Winner of Guitarist magazine’sAcoustic Guitarist of the Year2002 award and runner-upfor Perrier Young Musician2001, Stuart continues tomake a name for himself asone of the finest acousticguitarists in the UK.

He has spent years honing hiscraft with hundreds of soloappearances andmasterclasses, and came tothe attention of two of theworld’s greatest guitarists –Martin Taylor MBE and thelate Eric Roche – who bothencouraged his careerdevelopment and invited himto play alongside them.

He has performed solo onBBC Radio and TV and hasworked as a clinician/demoartist for major music brandssuch as Paul Reed Smithguitars and Vox amplifiers.

When not performing or inthe studio, Stuart holds thepost of Head of Guitar at theBristol Institute of ModernMusic.

page 8 www.brookguitars.com

Just what the Doctor ordered...

get too high up the neck most of thetime; a decent pick-up – a FishmanInfinity; and I wanted my initials on theheadstock truss rod cover, and a mattfinish throughout.

I pestered Simon on the first day ofeach month for photos showingprogress and I have a set (see below)showing the boards and neck cut toshape, then the body assembled, thenthe neck in place, and the bridge beingglued on; and finally the finishedbeautiful object that it is.

Having played the Tavy for 10 years, Iknew what to expect. When I boughtthat first Brook I had no idea of itsheritage through Andy Manson’stutelage and the many fine instrumentsSimon and Andy worked on with him. I do now have six Manson instruments andlove them all in different ways. The quality of the Brook workmanship and theirattention to detail shine through in the Okement’s build, finish, tone and action.

One small aside: I took my Tavy along tothe workshop because I wanted to photothem together there. Simon dropped itonto his bench for inspection anddeclared that he could not see anythingthat needed tweaking – not bad after 10years of frequent playing!

Of course, the Tavy had already had itsfree set-up (offered on all Brook

instruments). I am already looking forward to the Okement’s return in about ayear’s time when it has had time to settle...

from page 7

You can enjoy videos of Mike’s playing, his O’Carolan arrangements and muchmore at: http://www.docsworkshop.co.uk

Stuart Ryan pictured at Easterbrook with hislacewood back and sides Brook baritone Tavy

Stuart’sTorridge on

the coverof his

debut CD,‘The Coast

Road’

“

”

What they playwhat they say

&

www.brookguitars.com page 9

continued on page 10

That metaphor is only a small part of what Lesli’s music is all about. Following the recent release of his second full-length album, ‘Sleepwalkers’ Lament’, the Swedish-bornsinger/songwriter talked to Rob Jessep about his own particular brand of acoustic music – and the part a Brook Tavy baritone plays in it...

Imagine yourself being verysmall and finding yourselftrapped inside a steel stringguitar. While you struggle to getout, you’re suddenly immersedin a wall of guitar sound, angelicyet desperate voices, and thefaint sound of violins gettingstronger. In this environmentyou cannot help but to getdrawn into what you’rehearing...

““

Lesli: Sounds of StockholmRJ: How would you describe your music and how canreaders buy your albums?

L: I guess you could call it ‘acoustic folkpop’ orsomething similar to that… Just search for ‘Lesli’ oncdbaby.com or amazon.com and you'll find it.It’s all available as MP3s on itunes.com as well...

RJ: Do you have a band or other musicians that youregularly play with?

L: Well, no not a band exactly. I do almost all myliveshows as a solo act. However, many of the musicians

that appear on my albums I consider indispensable andI would definitely like to work with them again.Like Svante Henryson, who’s a world renowned cellist.He used to play electric bass in (rock guitarist) YngwieMalmsteen’s band…which is really cool! He’s a totallyunique cellist.

RJ: Tell us about the Sounds of Stockholmdocumentary that your songs are featured in onyoutube.

L: I met French videographer Valerie Toumayan in 2008when she enquired if we could do some filmclips

of me singing some tunes. She was in Stockholm thatweek, so I asked her to come by my studio and shootsome video of me playing. She did, and the clips turnedout great! So now, everytime that she’s in Stockholm,we’ll do some spontaneous footage of me playing inodd and interesting places. Valerie loves Swedish musicand has done alot of similar filming with other artistesas well… In 2010 her work culminated in the ‘SoundsOf Stockholm’ documentary, which featured me and awhole bunch of unknown and well-known artistesbased in Stockholm, Sweden.

page 10 www.brookguitars.com

RJ: Who are your influences? Tags in your YouTubevideos suggest that Jeff Buckley and Damien Ricemay be influences?

L: Yes, Buckley is a huge influence. I really like old folk-stuff as well, American and British artists like Donovan,Fairport Convention, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Crosby, Stills,Nash & Young, and all that… I started out playing inmetal bands, though, and I still really like bands like Tooland Mastodon, for example. As far as my guitar playing goes, I’ve been influenced alot by players like Pierre Bensusan, Stephen Bennett,Antoine Dufour, Andrew York, Tony McManus and PatMetheny, to name just a few.

RJ: Tell us about how you go about songwriting –lyrics first, or guitar parts?

L: It usually starts with the guitar. I’ll start by justnoodling on the guitar whenever I get the chance,eventually I’ll come up with a riff, pattern or harmonythat kind of spawns the singing melody, and finally thelyrics. This process takes me months sometimes, but ifI’m lucky I’ll write a song in 15 minutes, lyrics and all!This happened, for example, with my song ‘The Boy’from my second album. I wrote that one in like 10minutes, but usually it’s a longer, painstaking process.

RJ: What about your new Brook baritone? Was it acustom commission? Why a baritone? Have youstarted writing anything on it? How will it be tuned?And how did you hear of Brook?

L: I had been intrigued by the idea of a baritoneacoustic for quite some time, not really having thechance to actually play one. I knew I wanted a shorter

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Lesli: Sounds of Stockholmscale bari, and not one of those 29” beasts. When Istumbled across one on the Ivor Mairants website, Icouldn’t believe it! A used handmade 27” baritone for agreat price! That doesn't happen very often. I contacted store manager Mak Ogawa by email andthen by phone, and he was very helpful, sending meadditional pictures and a lot of info about the guitar. Ithought about it for a day or so and decided topurchase it. They sent it to Stockholm and it has beenmy big baby ever since then. I love it!I have certainly been writing on it, all the time since Ibought it! I’ve been experimenting with tunings andstring gauges; I usually have it tuned to C standard as astarting point. I use John Pearse handpicked sets, .015-.068, phosphor bronze.I knew of Brook guitars before I found the baritone.Through the years I had been spending hours and hourson their website, mostly in their ‘News’ section, droolingover all those beautiful custom creations! My baritone,and from what I’ve heard in various recordings onYouTube of their standard guitars, they have a uniquevoice that I really like, with a great voice and personality.They have a seasoned ‘antique stiffness’ to them that Ilove. Don’t get me wrong, these are loud and dynamicinstruments! They just have that special character that Ican’t find in my American luthier-made guitar.

RJ: For someone of thinking about adding a baritoneto their guitar collection, what advice would you give?

L: Think about how deep you’d like to go. A 27” scalebaritone is like a low tuned guitar, while 29” is moretowards a bass guitar – depending on tunings andstring gauges, of course. The woods might differ as well;what you’d like on a standard guitar might not be thesame on a baritone. Mine is the common combo of sitkaspruce/Indian rosewood, and it just works really well.

RJ: You describe yourself as an self-taught electricguitarist, and yet your albums are predominantlyacoustic? How come?

L: I had been working a bit as a session musician bothlive and in the studio, after years of playing in originalbands as well as cover bands. I played mostly electric,and in 2003 I think I got fed up with that. I took a breakfrom playing for a while. But the steel string changed allthat. I bought myself a decent steel string, wanting towrite some songs on it. It made me fall in love withplaying the guitar all again.

RJ: Tell us about your new album and what we canexpect?

L: Well, having two jobs and two children, it’ll belabelled as ‘a work in progress’ for quite some time. Ihave about half of it written – it’s really excitingmaterial! I started recording some demos and sketches

of the songs…and they turned out so well that thoseversions might be on the actual album. I have a semi-professional home studio where I can geta great acoustic guitar and vocal sound, so most of itwill probably be produced there. I would like to workwith more instruments though, add more percussiveelements to the sound this time, since my two earlieralbums has been mostly voice, guitar and strings.

RJ: Any plans to gig in the UK?

L: I would like to, but nothing planned at the moment. Ialmost played the Ventnor Fringe Festival on the Isle OfWight last August, but we had to cancel for multiplereasons. Anyone with a venue to play, and a budget forplane ticket, let me know – I’ll be happy to come andplay wherever you are!

RJ: What is the acoustic scene like in Sweden?

L: It’s getting bigger and bigger. Most acoustic artistsare singer/songwriters like me, but I think intrumentalacoustic music is slowly becoming bigger as well. There are also some emerging luthiers in Swedenbuilding great guitars. So I think people over here arebecoming more aware of what a great steel stringguitar can be, and are not settling for the ‘run of themill’ type stuff.

RJ: What album or artist do you listen to most oftenon your iPod?

L: I’ve been listing a lot to Donovan and Nick Drakelately. I have those on vinyl as well, and I’ll give ‘em aspin every once in a while…

RJ: Finally, if you could commission your ultimateacoustic guitar, what would it be?

L: Brook, Tamar body , Cocobolo back/sides, Europeanor Lutz spruce top, 27” baritone scale, joined at the 13thfret, sharp cutaway, old logo type.That’s my dream guitar right now – and I’m tempted to sellmy American guitar to finance it...

www.brookguitars.com page 11

continued on page 12

Playing the dots...When one of the world’s finest guitar makers asks you to build HIM an instrument, it’s a sure sign that youmust be doing something right! We spoke with luthier Kevin Aram to find out more about an ‘homage’Brook commission that quite literally knocked spots off the original...

Kevin Aram needs no introduction to those‘in the know’ when it comes to thedemanding world of top-flight classical

guitar luthierie.

His best-known customer is none other than JulianBream – and in the last quarter-century or so, Kevinhas built and repaired instruments for a veritable‘who’s who’ of other internationally famous players.

His clientele includes: Gilbert Biberian, CarlosBonell, Colin Downes, Anthea Gifford, ForbesHenderson, Joe Jewel, Earl Klugh, Eleftheria Kotzia,Norbert Kraft, Jonathan Leathwood, Juan Martin,Pepé Martinez, Friedemann Wuttke and JohnZaradin – to name but a few!

Simon worked from an Internet-sourced photo of a 1930s Regalto re-create a complete set of dominoes from ebony and bone

Kevin tries out his new guitar for the first time inthe Easterbrook ‘showroom’...

Unusually for many guitar builders, Kevin’s passionextends to collecting and playing the instrumenttoo, albeit not in the same style as the majority ofhis customers.

And when it came to wanting a custom steel-stringfor himself, he had no hesitation in turning to theteam at Brook Guitars.

“I’d known Andy and Simon since they beganworking with Andy Manson, and I have an oldTorridge which is probably the second instrumentthey ever built when they first set up on their own,”said Kevin.

“I’ve always believed that if you build an instrumentfor yourself, you’re always likely to be picking faultwith it – whereas if someone else makes it for you,you’re far more likely to accept it for what it is,which makes playing it much more enjoyable.

“I have built a few steel strings over the years, butmaking classical guitars is different in many ways –and in any case, the work that the lads do at Brookis just brilliant...”

The friendship and mutual admiration the makersshare has seen them collaborate regularly over theyears.

Simon explained: “Kevin will occasionally comeacross to the workshop to use a particular piece ofmachinery, like our big sander, and we often sourceand buy wood locally together.

“Steel string guitars are our mainstay, but we’vebuilt several nylon strung instruments too. They’reobviously made in a very different way, and Kevinhas always been incredibly generous and helpful atvarious stages, with advice on certain aspects oftheir construction, such as the strutting patternsand bracing.”

The inspiration for Kevin’s custom order came fromarticles from the Guild of American Luthiers, whichdescribed a series of restoration projects on – inKevin’s words – ‘guitars that were nice but not reallyworth a lot of money’.

Regally inspiredThe guitar that inspiredKevin’s custom order was aRegal ‘Le Domino’, one ofa line of inexpensive butflashy fretted instrumentswhich prospered in the1920s and early 1930s,and which remain someof the more distinctiveinstruments of the era.

The J.R. Stewart companyof Chicago originated the‘Le Domino’ family ofguitars, mandolins,soprano and tenor ukesand banjo-ukes starting inthe mid-1920s.

The brand passed to Regalin the early '30s afterStewart was forced out ofbusiness following adisastrous deal with Lyon& Healy. Le Domino ukesand banjo-ukes were thebest sellers.

Sold at a moderate price,these were well madeinstruments, compared toother decorated guitars.Grand Concert flat topguitars such as the onespictured here are todaycomparatively rare finds.

page 12 www.brookguitars.com

Playing the dots...One such restoration involved a Regal ‘Le Domino’guitar from the 1930s (see separate story, page 11). “I justreally liked the whole style of it,” said Kevin.

“I didn’t want an exact replica of it building; I optedinstead for a version based on a sunburst Torridge –similar to my original Brook – which I find is a reallycomfortable size guitar for me.

“It was the Regal’s domino decoration – which werestick-on transfers originally – that I particularly liked, soI managed to source a few pictures on the Internet, andasked Simon what he could do.”

Simon takes up the story: “Rather than a ‘copy’ guitar,Kevin wanted us to re-interpret the Regal in our ownparticular way.

“The domino transfers on the originals had a tendencyto flake and scrape off over the years, so we decided togo for something a little more permanent...”

How OLD is my guitar?TAKE a cursory look at the label inside aninstrument fresh from the Easterbrookworkshop today, and you could be forgivenfor thinking that there are more than200,000 Brooks in circulation!

Although output has been prolific since thecompany was launched – Andy and Simonestimate that it’s a fraction of that total, butstill ‘in excess of 1,000’ – the serial number infact enables you to accurately date your guitar.

So how does it work? “Think of it as pairs ofnumbers, first of all, running left to right – but

which you have to read in reverse,” said Andy.

Confused? Andy continues: “The first pair ofnumbers relates to the year. So, in the examplepictured left, ‘40’ translates to 2004. The nextpair of numbers – ‘40’ – is the month, readingbackwards ‘04’, or April. And finally, the last pairof numbers is the order the guitar wascompleted that month.

“That guitar (a custom Tamar), therefore, wasthe 11th to be finished in April 2004...”

So now you know...

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at a few other open mics and festivals too.“However, I have to say that I haven’t risked taking thenew guitar there just yet – I use the older Torridgeinstead!”

One thing is for certain: when Kevin eventually doesintroduce the instrument to the pub, the locals won’thave far to look for a set of dominoes...

You can find out more about Kevin and his work at:www.aramguitars.co.uk

Simon’s solution was to painstakingly make a completeset of miniature dominoes in ebony and bone, whichwere then used as both fretboard markers and as therosette decoration around the soundhole.

Faithful to the original concept, he ensured that thenumber of dots on the ‘fingerboard dominos’corresponded to the fret they were inlaid at (for example,three dots at the third fret, and so on), right up to the12th fret (see below, right) . The remaining 22 dominoeswere then arranged and inlaid around the soundhole.

Kevin – whose own work has set a benchmark ofexcellence admired worldwide – was delighted withthe results: “It’s brilliant – a fantastic guitar,” he said.

“The thing with Andy and Simon’s work is that all theirguitars look lovely, but they’re all completely handworked too – in exactly the same way as my owninstruments – whereas so much elsewhere these days isdone by CNC (computer numerical control) machinery.”

The music Kevin himself plays is in stark contrast to thatof his own customers: “It’s a mixture of various songs,some murder ballads, and some more modern stuff –Steve Earle, John Prine, Johnny Cash, that sort of thing,”he laughed. “I’m also a big fan of Half Man Half Biscuit,and I do a sort of one-man tribute act called ‘songs witha bite’.

“My wife and I run an open mike night with anothercouple the last Friday of every month at The New Inn inGoodleigh, near Barnstaple, which is where I mainly getto play these days, although I usually find time to play