They had a article on the "Duke of Pearl" in Fretboard Journal several months back. Seems he was mainly a banjo builder for sometime. I wish i could find pics of another one he did. The headstock looked like a face with necktie inlay on the neck and a boot shaped heal.
Like this one here it was very cool.......different but cool!
I remember back in the 60's when he was still doing inlay work.
He inlaid a "Mastertoad" banjo with little frogs for the fret markers, a "Monstertone" with dinosaurs, and a "C. F. Mutton" guitar with sheep for fret markers.
He also did a custom job where he inlaid a friend of mine's electric guitar in huge Merle Travis style letters. It said (wait for it...) "Mother Of Pearl".
They had a article on the "Duke of Pearl" in Fretboard Journal several months back. Seems he was mainly a banjo builder for sometime. I wish i could find pics of another one he did. The headstock looked like a face with necktie inlay on the neck and a boot shaped heal.
Like this one here it was very cool.......different but cool!
Chuck has a wacky sense of humor, but is VERY sane... and extremely intelligent. Yes, he was a banjo builder for a long time... I think he burned out on it. He did some gold mining for a while, and then got into being an inlay material supplier. The amazing thing to me was that he built and worked on banjos for many years, but didn't start playing until something like 15-20 years ago, and developed a very nice traditional Bluegrass style. My take on is that as a banjo maker and inlayer, he sees banjo making from "behind the curtain" and just sees it as a machine, although a fun one... and is maybe doing some iconoclastic sacred cow-tipping in the process!!!
Awesome! My steampunk pickholder would go well with that, gives me some ideas for a resonator... but no where near the great craftsmanship on the Mad Max, very inspiring.
As a long time sculptor, the materials I use have very specific meaning and are intentionally chosen and placed, as I'm sure Chuck does with his work. Clock pieces are not haphazardly glued on.
The nice thing about time is that it moves forward:-)
