Video Interview with Catherine R. Currier

CC: I tell you, there's a book by Bruce Oatley called, Understanding Wood,

that is the most comprehensive woodworking book that ever was. Bruce, I think

its Bruce Oatley, O-a-t-l-e-y, Understanding Wood. Mine is at home. I don't have

it down here or I would share it with you. If you want to learn some basics

about wood--

BG: Bruce, what?

CC: Oatley. I think its Oatley, O-a-t-l-e-y. Let me call John and ask him. Well,

you just pull-up "Understanding Wood."

BG: Yeah.

CC: That's the name of it and it's a fabulous book. I have read it, I think I've

read it five times.

CC: Ok, your turn.

BG: Ok, so you said you could learn something every day?

CC: Yeah, every day I learned something new. That's what's so nice about

repairing; you never get bored. You are learning that every instrument is a 1:00little bit different. It might be braced a little different; especially

classical guitar builders, just different stuff and you go, oh, I didn't know I

could do that. Check it out. Give it some ideas. The last builders' conference

that I went to I got the idea to put some ports in my ukulele. Be as daring as

you want to be.

BG: Are you going to use that in guitars that you get? Are people going to start

doing it in guitars?

CC: Nah, not already built guitars. It may come to that. People may come in and

go, "Can you put a whole in the side of my guitar?" It's harder to do that when

the guitar is already assembled. When you are building something you can cut

holes because you have to reinforce the inside edges, so that's hard to do. It's

like this one, I said to John, "Oh I wish I had put some ports in it," and he

said, "Well it's too late now because it's already glued together." If I had

done it before I glued it together, I don't want to do it now, but my next one I

probably will put some ports in it.

BG: I like the way that's joined. Can you show us that, where the neck is going

to join in there?

CC: Isn't that 2:00neat looking? Just a beautiful little dovetail, and when this is

done it will look a whole lot different. It's not completely finished yet. It is

a dovetail, compound dovetail, and I've got a little bit more fitting to do.

BG: Is that glued in there, or what?

CC: Oh yeah, it's glued in there, and then this neck is a blank, it's called a

blank, it's a big huge thing. I've got to put the fingerboard on it next, the

fret board.

BG: When you say a blank, that means you are going to carve it down?

CC: Yeah, I'm going to carve it down, carve it down for this to fit. So it will

get a whole lot taken off of it still. That's the next process. I glue this on

and start carving.

BG: If you cut too much off--

CC: Then you have to start over again, or modify it.

BG: Have you ever had a repair that you felt bad about because it was messed up

or anything like that?

CC: If I did I forgot about it.

BG: Oh good.

CC: You never remember the bad stuff, you only remember the good stuff, Bob.

BG: The good ones you remember.

CC: I don't remember too many bad ones.

BG: But you get a lot of 3:00people in here asking for crazy stuff.

CC: I do, some crazy stuff, yeah--

BG: Are your customers just from the Richmond area or are they from all over?

CC: They are from all over. Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee-- I'm trying to think.

I don't think I've had any sent from very far away in the last little bit-- all

over Kentucky, yeah, because I think there is only one other authorized repair

center in the state and that's out in western Kentucky, so I even get people

from Louisville and Cincinnati-- Ashland.

BG: How do you get authorized by them?

CC: They look at some of the things you've built and some of the repair work

you've done, and you're salesman is a really integral part of that decision

because he's, the salesman that sales Martin guitars to me, he's in here and

he's seen what I've done.

BG: Did you have to submit something to him?

CC: No, they just come in here and look, the salesman does, and my reputation I

think, they got a reference from Taylor guitars and from the guy that I 4:00 built

mandolins with also.

BG: Oh ok.

CC: So that, you know, what work you've done previously.

BG: Homer was one too, wasn't he?

CC: He was, a long time ago. He was-- Before I ever did any repair work, I think

he was. He did a lot of good work, but he got older and his eyes got bad and

that's the thing I always worry about is my eyes, and you can't do as good of

repair work.

BG: You can't see what you're looking at.

CC: That's right. You have to be able to see it. That's why I have these little

magnifying glasses all over the place. If I need to see something really little,

I mean, I use them. This one has a magnifying glass in it, and the one on my

bench has a magnifying glass in it too.

BG: Yeah, could you describe some of the stuff that's on your bench here? All

those bottles and things, what's all that?

CC: Oh, those little bottles and things are--

BG: Glues?

CC: Dust. There's all kinds of different dust that I use for, when I'm doing a

repair, like bone dust and ebony dust. Then there are little pieces and parts.

There 5:00are stains that I mix up in those little bottles. Any little things that I

don't want to loose. Spikes. Little bitty screws. Little hardware stuff, lots of

hardware. Your basic tools: files, screwdrivers, there are a lot of special

tools, specialized reamers, lots of hand tools, lots of files. The set of tools

I use more than anything probably are these little guys' right here and they are

called nut files. I mean, I'm actually ready for a new set because these guys

work really good down here and they are worn out up here. I need to--

BG: What are they?

CC: There are how I file the slots in these little guys right here.

BG: They are going sideways like this?

CC: Uh huh, you go like this. This is my third set.

BG: Why are they a set?

CC: Because you have different, your groves range from ten to eleven thousandths

on up to the fifty/sixty thousandths, so you have to have different 6:00sized, look

at the edge of them, different sized files for different groves. See the

different edge on them?

BG: Sure. So like, the E-string there would take a smaller one and then the

next-- Ok, I see.

CC: So lots of specialized files and specialized saws.

SA: Can you hold those up again for me?

CC: Sure, these are called nut files, and every edge is a different thickness.

BG: Oh ok, so you don't need six of them.

CC: There are actually eight different sizes here, but you have to remember that

I have light gauge and medium gauge, and I have electric guitars and acoustic

guitars, so I could need, more like twelve or fifteen different sizes, but these

are the most common ones.

BG: Where do you buy those?

CC: I buy them from-- there are a couple of different suppliers. One of them is

called Stewart MacDonald, and Luthiers Mercantile. Grizzly, which used to just

make big tools, also has a big luthier department now. There are quite a few

places; probably Steward MacDonald and 7:00Luthiers Mercantile are the biggest ones

that I get stuff from. Grobet is a jeweler's supply, but I use a lot of tools

that they may also. Grobet.

BG: Have you got some here?

CC: Well, I have more files over here that I've got from Grobet probably.

BG: Ok.

CC: You know, stuff like that.

BG: I see, Instrument Makers White Glue in a big thing down there, is that?

CC: This stuff here? Where do you see that?

BG: It's hidden underneath the--

CC: Instrument Makers White Glue--

BG: Right there.

CC: Oh yeah, this was given to me by a friend of mine. This is his own glue that

he's made up.

BG: Oh ok.

CC: A friend of mine, this is actually Luthiers Mercantile, but a friend of mine

that does bass repair gave this to me in Galax, Virginia last year. He said,

"This is what you need, and keep it in the refrigerator so it stays nice and

fresh." We were just talking about working on 8:00basses and he's a luthier, he just

gave this to me.

BG: Oh ok.

CC: He was really nice. Luthiers are strange people. They have very opinionated,

they have their ideas, so he gave me this and said keep it in the refrigerator,

and I forgot that it was there. So there are lots--

BG: It's not in the refrigerator.

CC: I know it. It needs to be in the refrigerator. It will last longer. Then I

have this stuff. I just got this stuff back in. This is called "Angel Polish."

This is like forty dollars for this bottle of stuff. This friend of mine in

Tennessee makes this. He has his own store. But there is a really neat story

about this stuff called Angel Polish. This is the only thing I'll use on

high-end instruments and violins. Ten or fifteen years ago he offered this

formula to Chris Martin--

BG: At Martin guitars?

CC: At Martin guitars, and I think his grandmother or his grandfather made this

polish. And he lost it, and then his grandmother died and he was cleaning out

her house and he'd lost the 9:00formula, he was getting ready to get rid of all of

her clothes and he was checking the pockets and he found the formula in one of

the pockets of one of her coats. He started making it again. Well Chris said,

"Nah, he didn't want the formula," and this was years ago, and now it's so

popular I guess Chris had called him and said, "Well, we would like to have this

now," and he said, "Nah, I'm selling too much of it by myself." But it's

wonderful stuff. I don't know what is in it, but it is the best polish I have

ever used.

BG: Do you use it on guitars?

CC: I use it on old instruments, like what I've done with that bass. It's got an

older, oxidized finish and I'll use this and it will just make it shine like a

new penny. The more you rub it, the shinier it gets.

BG: So how do you--

CC: Put it on with one rag and wipe it off with another. And you don't have to

let it dry like pieced wax, it's just wonderful stuff. It's called Angel Polish.

BG: Angel Polish.

CC: And my customers come in here and ask for it by name. I've been carrying it

for about ten years.

BG: There's no label for it?

CC: No, no, this is my shop one. The ones I sell up front are little bottles and

they are twelve dollars and they have labels on them.

BG: Oh I see.

CC: He made this big one for my 10:00 shop.

BG: Oh that's great.

CC: Yeah. I just got some more back in. It's wonderful stuff. There is lots of

specialized stuff--

BG: Is there another one of those back--

CC: Yeah, I just got that-- that does have the label on it. That goes downstairs

in my shop. I have one down there and one up here.

BG: So you don't use that on wood before you put a finish on it?

CC: No, it has to have a finish on it.

BG: So that's to polish it up?

CC: Right.

BG: And I see over there you've got a banjo on some kind of contraption. What is

that thing?

CC: It's called "The Apprentice." It's a jig that holds an instrument. So when I

need another set of hands, you can turn it sideways. Want me to get up and show you?

BG: Sure.

CC: I don't have this in it right now; so let me take it out.

BG: You bought that from somebody I guess?

CC: Actually, this was a gift. I can clamp an instrument in here, and if I need

to hold it a certain way to fix a crack or do something with it I can set it

straight up, I can twist it 11:00 around--

BG: Somebody gave that to you?

CC: This is a retired engineer makes this. He inadvertently insulted me at a

luthier's conference. He apologized, it was no big deal, and then when I got

home two weeks later I had one of these setting at the front door and he said,

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to insult you," he had said something derogatory about

women luthiers--

BG: Oh.

CC: -- and he said, "Please accept this as a gift." So he gave it to me.

BG: So do other luthiers use that?

CC: Yeah, I mean, I don't know how popular it is. I like it. I don't use it a

lot, but I do use it, and it's a, I like it for holding something I've just

glued or done some finish work on the top of it so I know it's not going to get

touched and it's not going to get moved around. But yeah, it does come in pretty handy.

BG: I see some solder over there.

CC: That's for working on band instruments.

BG: Ok. Is that a clarinet you are working on?

CC: That's a flute.

BG: A flute.

CC: That's a flute, yeah.

BG: Are those Bunsen Burners or something?

CC: Those are little 12:00 torches.

BG: Little torches. Ok.

CC: Propane torches and they are wonderful for doing soldering work, for heating

up a pad to seat it. For a pad in an instrument like a clarinet or a saxophone

to seat properly you heat it up a bit.

BG: Oh ok.

CC: Yeah, these are nice little guys. These are little things called "Blazer

torches." I love them.

BG: So you get those from other people?

CC: Yeah, band instrument suppliers. You can get this at Ace Hardware actually.

Ace Hardware has these now. Plumbers use them. Used to be I could only order

these through a catalogue but now you can get them anywhere.

BG: What's inside of them? Is that gas or something?

CC: Yeah, its stuff you use for those little lighters. Is it propane?

BG: Yeah.

CC: I think its called propane. Yeah. Here it is. Altura Butane. I'm sorry.

Butane. You put it in that way. Yeah. Butane fuel. All kinds of fun toys.

BG: But you said you might have to move from here.

CC: I might.

BG: How can you set this up in another place?

CC: Carefully.

BG: Carefully?

CC: 13:00Slowly. I hope we don't have to, but we've moved twice before. You know,

it's a really good way to get organized and get everything clean.

BG: Moving?

CC: You have to look at it, you have to make lemonade out of that lemon or else

you'll go crazy. But it will be ok. It will be fine.

BG: I imagine when you are in some place like this for a long time you adapt

things to work for you, then you have to rethink it out.

CC: You have to look at the space you have. I have my shop spread out pretty big

downstairs and I might have to, there's no way I'm ever going to find another

building as big as this, I don't really need as much space as we have here, but

I do need a certain amount of space for my tools and stuff like that.

BG: Well I saw downstairs that you have a workshop, and we might take some video

of that, but I also saw an area where it looks like the ukulele group--

CC: We have a classroom where we teach piano theory classes down there. I also

teach my set-up classes down there. I move a bunch of tables in and put 14:00 pieces

of carpet on them and then when I teach repair classes, how to set-up your

guitar or whatever, everyone brings their instruments in and we set them on the

tables. That classroom space is just invaluable, it's really nice to have it.

BG: Wait a minute. You said earlier that set-up takes a lot of skill to do. Are

you teaching people to set-up on their own?

CC: I'm teaching them the basics. That doesn't mean that they can go out there

and make a living at it, because it is very tedious. Like when somebody comes in

here and pays me to do something, they'll want it done right, but I teach a

set-up class, and I teach you the basics of how to adjust the saddle up and

down, and how to straighten the neck, a lot of people are just afraid and

totally freaked out about trying to adjust their neck, and as long as you are

cautious about it, you can do your own instruments. Don't do somebody else's,

but do your own. How to adjust the nut, how to tighten everything up like the

keys so they aren't rattling. How to check the inside of the instrument with a,

this is probably one of my other tools that I use a lot, a light. I don't want

to turn my light on, but we have a light that we put down inside the guitar and

a 15:00mirror that we use to check and make sure that nothing has broken lose.

There are basic maintenance stuff that people can to do maintain their

instruments properly, and there are a lot of people that own ten to fifteen

instruments. Well that's pretty expensive for them to bring all of the

instruments in for me to repair, so I don't mind. I charge a hundred dollars for

a clinic and its two to three hours. Every now and again when I get enough

people on my roster, I like to have five to seven people, we'll do one. It's fun.

BG: So there are people who just own guitars or instruments--

CC: Who will want to learn how to do it, and believe me, if I teach you how to

do a set-up you'll understand it a whole lot more than just reading a book. It's

one thing to read a book--

BG: We were talking earlier about setting my guitar up. If I took that class

would I never bother you again about it?

CC: No, because believe me, there's going to be a time when you are going to go,

"I can't get that buzz out of my guitar!" and it will be a high fret, because I

can't teach you about everything because there are high frets, it might have a

fret level, or you might have a 16:00little too much back bow. Just because I show

you how to do something doesn't mean that you can do it perfect. Believe me,

sighting a guitar neck is something that everybody can't do.

BG: I feel like if I took a class like that I would think that I would ruin my guitar.

CC: No you wouldn't ruin it. You'd have fun playing with it though. There are

some people that want to piddle-paddle around with their instruments.

BG: You can't really ruin it I guess, right, because you can always fix it?

CC: Yeah. Well, unless you just start turning the truss rod and break it, that's

one way, but you have to be, and that's one thing I emphasize, half of a turn is

a lot when you are adjusting a guitar neck.

BG: I wish you had told me that the other day.

CC: Did you break your neck Bob?

BG: Nah, I'm just kidding.

CC: I mean, we are talking, just a little bitty turn. Watch this. I'm not sure

which one of these I need for this one. This has an adjustable truss rod. When I

say a turn, I don't think I have it yet, that's a turn, that much.

BG: Gosh really, ok.

CC: That's a lot right 17:00 there.

BG: And that moved it.

CC: That probably moved it. I'm going to look at it and see in a second. So

you've got to be pretty-- yeah, but it needs a little bit more. It's no big

deal. But you've got to know how to look at it and to know what to do. You can't

be willy-nilly and go in there and start messing around. You gotta, like the

girl, another person who helps me out sometimes, she is scared to death to do

neck adjustments because she's afraid she's going to break a truss rod and once

you've, well let me tell you something, when you've heard a truss rod break,

it's like a shot, you go ok, I just ruined that guitar because, and I do have a

new tool that can fix it, but most of the time you've ruined that guitar when

you've broken a truss rod because a lot of guitars aren't worth pulling the

fingerboard off and putting a new truss rod in.

BG: What, is it spring loaded or something? How would you ruin it? It's just a

rod isn't it?

CC: It's a rod, but it's a rod that is bent in such a way that when you tighten

it, it bows the neck 18:00forward or back.

BG: Oh, I didn't realize that.

CC: It's a torque; it's a truss rod that counteracts the tension of the strings,

which is about one hundred and twenty-five PSI.

CC continues: So yeah, you can mess one up pretty quickly if you try.

BG: Ok.

CC: But, if I teach you in class, you are going to understand the do's and

don'ts, and you're going to understand how far you can go, and we'll do hands

on, you will actually do repair work while you are there at the class.

BG: Ok. I'm going to take a class this summer on how to fix my window at my house.

CC: That's great.

BG: And that takes all week actually.

CC: That's great. You can come to my house when you are done.

BG: I'll be certified and set. So we were talking about the space down there,

you also have a ukulele club that meets every other week?

CC: Every other week. We have a ukulele club we 19:00started about a year ago. We

play and sing and have so much fun. It's great.

BG: Now do you have traditional artists come down there and jam ever? Like with

stringed band music?

CC: Well, anybody is invited. Actually, we have this guy, Chris Sullivan from

Lexington; he comes and brings his saw [uncertain of term] and his Dobro and

plays with us occasionally. You can bring anything you want. It's mainly a

ukulele club, but we don't care if you show up with something else.

BG: Is this the only ukulele club in Kentucky that you know of?

CC: I don't know. That's a good question. I should get online and Google that,

but I don't care, I'm not going to go anywhere else, I want to stay here. That's

why I want to have the ukulele club here, I won't travel to Louisville or

anywhere else to go to one. I mean I guess I would once or twice to see how they

do things, I don't know. There are big ones I know in other cities, in New York

there's a big ukulele club, in Colorado I know there is a big one, there is a

big one in Santa Cruz, California, that's actually on that documentary that I

was telling you about.

BG: Are you guys going to perform for other 20:00 people?

CC: If we get-- We're getting better. We're getting pretty good. Actually, the

people who weren't very serious have all dropped out and all the people who are

real serious are coming. I mean, I'm not talking serious, serious, I'm talking

about people who want to practice and want to learn and want to learn more than

three chords. The first group of people, they were, they didn't practice, they

didn't care, they just wanted to play easy, easy stuff. Now the new group of

people that are coming every week, they really want to play some good stuff. So

we are having fun and we are getting better, so we might play out sometime.

BG: What do you mean, good stuff?

CC: More than three chords. A little more involved.

BG: More than three chords in the song.

CC: Yeah. A little more involved music. If you can't play more than three

chords, why are you doing this? Let's get a little more; let's practice a

little. Let's be a little more dedicated.

BG: On ukulele you have to sing with it too, to make it sound good.

CC: No, you don't have to, but we do.

BG: Yeah, ok.

CC: But we do, that's the fun part of it. Singing and playing.

BG: Cool.

CC: We have a couple of people that are very accomplished that come and they are

very entertaining because they are very 21:00good. We have kids and we have old

people, and we have everyone in between. We just have a great time. So maybe in

five or six years we will have thirty or forty members and we'll get out there

and play in the nursing homes or on the circuit, whatever.

BG: Well I've got dulcimer players who would always say, when I had the Festival

going on, they would say, "Oh can we perform at the Festival." Yeah, ok,

sometimes we would have like fifty dulcimer people on stage, it was kind of

overwhelming, but it's interesting too, so I was just wondering if the ukulele

club would do something.

CC: We will eventually. We aren't there yet. We're just having fun getting to

know each other and learning the music.

BG: Is there food involved or anything?

CC: No.

BG: No?

CC: No, and I wanted to do that, and they all boo-hoed it. No food or drink.

They didn't want to put me out, and its here. I said, "Well every week or every

other week somebody can bring something." "Nah, we just want to come and play

music." That's all we do. Now I would like to, maybe once a year, I know in

California, I think it's in the San Diego 22:00club, once a year or twice a year they

meet in this restaurant and they have the ukulele jam. People get up who have

never performed before get up and they have performances, and you sign-up to

perform, but all the people in the audience are playing along with you, if you

want them too. They have a copy of what you are going to play, and then you get

up there and sing and lead the whole group and play and sing and they eat and

they party and have a great time. It sounds like a lot of fun. So maybe sometime

we will do something like that, but right now we are just--

BG: I told you I bought my son one and he got into it because of that heavy set

guy from Hawaii who played--

CC: Brother Iz (Israel Kamakawiwo'ole).

BG: Yeah, he played--

CC: "Somewhere Over the Rainbow".

BG: Yeah, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." It was beautiful.

CC: Now the new guy, Jake Shimabukuro, Google him, because he is fabulous. He is

in that documentary, if you want to take that and watch it. He's just

phenomenal. He's just like a prodigy, and he's playing with everybody. This guy

has been playing ukulele since he was four years, and I guess he is twenty-five

or thirty and he is just wonderful. Jake 23:00Shimabukuro. All the best guys are from Hawaii.

BG: It's kind of been bred I guess. Part of their traditions--

CC: Yeah, that's what they play. Exactly. That's where the best guys are.

CC: Anything else?

BG: Well, do you feel like we covered everything?

CC: I think so. We covered a lot.

BG: Yeah. 24:00 [silence]

BG: That butter knife thing, the knife we were talking about--

CC: Uh huh.

BG: What was that?

CC: It's a thin blade that you use to remove, once you've heated this up, to

remove a bridge, to remove an extension of a fingerboard, and to remove a, it's

just a thin blade--

BG: And you don't have to buy a fancy--

CC: Well I have fancy tools too, but the ones you make are the neatest. I have a

whole drawer full of these guys. Check these out. You never know, this is just

some of them, and a lot of these are painter knives for painting, you know, to

get in and feel a brace that is lose, to help remove an internal bridge patch,

to spread some glue. This is for feeling a bridge patch; I made this one, on the

inside of something. This is to get into a little bitty place and work. Aren't

these neat? Just fun little tools, and a lot of these 25:00are painters' tools.

BG: Ok. What's your favorite tool you ever made?

CC: My favorite tool I ever made?

BG: Yeah, did you come up with something?

CC: Oh god, umm, oh that's a good question. My favorite tool I ever made-- I

have a couple of favorite tools, but I didn't make them.

BG: Oh ok.

CC: Let me show ya. I love-- these are just funky little things. I will bring

them over 26:00there on the bench. Give me a second. I think two or three of them are

right here if I can find them. This is a tool, believe it or not, when you have

a mandolin strung up, this is a hammer from off of a piano, when you have a

mandolin strung up and it has a moveable bridge on it, sometimes you have to

move it, it's really hard to have to grab ahold of it and move it, but I can

just tap the edge of that bridge and bring it back. My boyfriend came up with this.

BG: Is that from a piano?

CC: Yeah, that's a piano hammer.

BG: Ok.

CC: And I can tap it and it doesn't hurt anything. I've got another couple here

that I want to show you, but I don't think they are there. I wonder where they

are. My bench is such a mess right now. So it's kind of like, the little things

are the fun ones, and I can't put my hands on them right now I don't think. I

have friends that have built tools for me and I can't find anything right now.

You know, I mean, you 27:00make little sanding things like this all the time. I just

love little things like this.

BG: Will you show a little bit about what you did with the bass there?

CC: Oh sure.

BG: Because you were showing that to me, but--

CC: Ok, let me come over to this side. This is an old K. The first thing we did,

I took the fingerboard off of it and I spliced in a piece of wood because it was

cracked right here. It had been dropped. See, you can't hardly see that. Then we

put the fingerboard back on and sanded this down and you can't hardly even tell.

Even the stain came out totally perfect. So that repaired this neck because it

was made to be really little and it broke. And then, when people are using

upright basses, when they are done playing they set them down on their side on

the ground, so what suffers are the edges. So this one has had fifty or sixty

years of suffering, and almost all the edges here, all the edges on that side,

they were all broken 28:00off. So I have made pieces out of this piece of Maple right

here. I've cut up this piece of Maple and, you can see where the contour, cut

off from this solid piece of Maple to make all new pieces for the back. Now for

the top it was Spruce, and we about half of that was gone. I had to cut pieces

out of a Spruce blank and glue them in there and sand them down and contour them

and now I'm getting ready to finish them with stain and lacquer. And that was

about a seven hundred dollar repair.

BG: You did some things to the front too I guess.

CC: Yeah. I had to do the edges on the front too, and I can't turn it over right

now because I'm staining this right now. It's turned out real nice. Here's the

deal. This lady wears dresses a lot in church, and all this stuff that was broke

off would constantly grab her clothes. She hated it. She said to her husband, "I

want 29:00my bass fixed," and all this junk here, this one we didn't fix because it

wasn't really bad, but all of this was just real jagged and grabby, grab your

clothes, so now it's nice and smooth. Because a bass, you're hugging it when you

are playing it.

BG: So to keep it from happening again, you are going to tell her to do

something different?

CC: Nah, it will happen again.

BG: Ok.

CC: There's no way around it. Unless they are really nice with it. Laying it

down on carpet is ok, but when you are in a lot of these old churches, they

don't have carpet, they just lay them down on the concrete floor, the tile

floor. Hauling them around, this has had fifty or sixty, seventy years worth of use.

BG: Did you say that Homer put a skinnier neck on that?

CC: No, he took the neck that was on it and shaved it down. Took it down a lot.

Yeah, it's really little, and that's where it busted, right there. So it got

dropped and had a big crack in it right there.

BG: Now it's still going to take the action of the strings.

CC: Yeah, it's fine. It's good now.

BG: Ok. Well I think that's, we got a lot 30:00here. Thank you.

CC: You're welcome. Thank you.

BG: Is it ok to put this in the archive where they are going to give?

CC: Sure.

BG: Ok, I have a little thing for you to sign.

CC: Yeah, a release form.

BG: Release form. Yep.

CC: Sure, I don't mind.