Featured GuitarViol build display
"Happy endings" and "new beginnings" to the challenge of our times!
Dear peeps, the times have changed a lot! (Right?)
All of that aside, I have never been more excited about the state of the art!! Best ones ever! On the other hand, I won’t kid you, it is massive stress operating in this particular dispensation of time! (You are likely experiencing the banes of the present as well). Nevertheless, your enthusiasm keeps it going! Every day I manage to open the doors of the shop is a blessing! As recent times have demonstrated, we should not take a day for granted! [This I write thinking of the horrific fire in Maui. So hard to process that alone! In Southern California, the rains are coming down from Hurricane Hillary with a 5.1 earthquake on the side. Please, Klaus, give it a rest! ].
The project/backlog business model that operated between ground zero 2002 up to December 2022 did NOT age well with the times and I have to literally engineer a new path to abate all the old backlog! (Yes, I attempted to drain this particular swamp back in 2018 but we all know what happened along the way…reality bites!) The shakedown of the last several years has not been kind to old numbers that turned out to be rather arbitrary in light of the pivot to recently altered logistics, hence, processes; the data of which is still being developed (real time) in a most contrary era! Cruel timing for the big audacious 10x “Plan”. We DO it Anyway!! So, we sail, tack to the wind, strategically, zig zag to a windward (challenging) up-wind destination. We plan; God directs those who tack that windward (win-ward) channel through high winds and rough seas! . Perfect storms do not care about our best, well intended, planning efforts (turns out). The mission remains when the resistance does not care about the rigid checklist or goals! We tack, even jibe (when we have to). The ocean can be your big beautiful friend! But, no quarter if you disrespect it’s ability to destroy your well planned (ideal/optimal) journey! No, it is your passengers you are 1000% committed to bring safely ashore to the destination end you committed to! My take-away message to those who estimate on past averages and optimal outcomes is this: Optimal goals are the aim; the journey is the real destination! Make it a great one! Setbacks are the scar-tissue that makes us become stronger. Those who had negative programming early in life through tragic circumstances and have overcome to the extent of survival and some victories: I salute you! It is not an easy journey; but a divinely assigned one. Keep your true authentic North; even when the world changes. If the world has lost it’s rudder, at least make the North Star the reference point when calibrating the compasses after chaos. Thrash to windward (Win-ward) we must!
Pivot on the fly - thrash to windward!! (For the big broad reach…)
I stopped taking long range projects (i.e. old queue backlog model) after December 2022. The math (of last decade’s projects to 2021) is lousy in today’s setting so the fewer new builds have to go to the quick flip display (new beginnings) at a premium. The queue has been deep shuffled between pre-2021/2022 to optimize (scientifically by hierarchy of math; rigid chronology is not an option - to stay open - unless some miraculous fortune falls from the sky! God willing? Keep the faith I say!). The goal is to end (fulfill) the backlog cycle of the last 20 years (happy endings) and move forward with the best of the new pop-up Xen-x models (new beginnings).
The “New Beginnings” display fixture is now designated to be the operating center/focal point for the leading edge of the latest developments! These breakthroughs benefit those waiting in the long queue! Like that particular look of one at the leading edge/New Beginnings rack? Guess what? It will be repeated! [See here] So, as I cycle those on the “Happy endings” rack, the very next ones will likely be just like what was on the “New beginnings” rack! The old queue, with locked in rate from a different time, will be rewarded with the absolute best of what has been developed! Happy endings! The new arrivals will have the the latest development at the new rate; New beginnings!
Not retiring! But, as the friendly airliner pilot often says mid flight “we are beginning our initial descent into JFK from 30k altitude though the landing gear is not out yet…to our left is a nice view pf the Ohio valley….” Truth is, there is no “soft landing” for a person crazy enough to devote an entire life to modern Arpeggiones/GuitarViols. Age has something to do with it. Someone who is a master of an arcane GuitarViol craft late in life and one who has all life’s “ducks in a perfect row” - does not go in the same sentence! We have seen such stories throughout the centuries! Celebrate them! My particular inspiration back in the late 80’s was Johan Stauffer who apparently died in the poorhouse (though I did not get the memo at the time!) Stauffer invented the Arpeggione I read about in a 1948 Britannica V volume for violin chapter that measured about 1” thick! An obscure chapter. Who would research that an make a career? Yep. 2023 is the bicentennial of the Arpeggione of 1823. Stauffer, from Austria, is perhaps the most copied guitar builder in the world! His 6 in line tuner pattern (Fender/Bigsby) and other features as well as having a certain apprentice named C.F. Martin built his business on Stauffer patterns! This makes zero sense to the average pensioner; bread and circuses type. I thank the rest of you! You, support future history; if they don’t scrub it!
As most of you dear readers know, demand has always outpaced an instrument that was launched in it’s early stages and developed over time. It was never “ready for prime time” for mass manufacturing interests! (Somehow people have expected that from me but not really knowing the true nature what was being asked!) Juggling both “build it yesterday” pressure and “develop to repeatable” is no mean feat! (Imagine the stress of “how’s my GV coming along, I have a movie project….” times 30 (a year) in an accordion flex domino row? Ebb and flow? For two decades straight? Tyranny of the urgent? Most people can not imagine that! Many hand builders barely make less than 10 per year). Living in the twilight of art and hand craft with the public’s expectations of factory volume (and wishful consumer price in many cases) is a lot more challenging than it sounds! (That path was approached, nothing stuck. Either way, it takes a lot of up front capital only to find out that the partnering company, otherwise good at making guitars, sucks at making GuitarViols - don’t get me started on imitators). The irony is that the Zenith (epitome) of my work now has the engineering pretty much worked out (previously untapped because I was too busy cranking out hand work and aging in the process! Would you like fries with that?). This all emerging at at time when the world can not decide if it want’s to be an austere proletariat serfdom planet to depopulate? or an otherwise happy thriving petty bourgeois planet? (Really? Why is that actually a thing?) Anyway, not the world I envisioned for the Xen-x (10x) and all the blood, sweat, and tears it took to get here! (is that it?). Nevertheless, I am honored that my work has made a difference for many in the soundtrack industry for the last couple decades! Many have scaled to great heights of success with the special tools I made them! My reward? Not the quaint retirement home on a coastal vineyard with a studio barn; simply another awesome day running the GuitarViol shop in Valencia! Come by for coffee! (No, I do not even own a personal GV of my own). The cobbler has holes in his own shoes…and insomnia.
It seems like a great niche to have 95% of build clients (about 400+ in number) be professional media composers! How cool it is to hear in Movies TV? On the other hand, it doesn’t take more than writers/actors strikes and weak streaming revenue shares (and AI) to realize just how fragile (precarious) the downstream of all that economy is! The irony was that in the summer of 2002, I was building a better version of a 1993 prototype with Windham Hill like recording ambitions. Truth is, I was ran over by my own creation. LOL. Literally too busy making GuitarViols to get much guilt-free playing in. On the other hand, serving a lot of awesome talented people along the way has a lot of upsides!
New beginnings…happy endings.
What does that look like? We really do not know yet! For now, just working away at the new (organic composite) models and finally “cracking the code” to ones that do not get held up in the forever detailing art department! Reach out and inquire! As always, honored to be of service in these times!
Curious? Reach out! Jonathan 818-268-5602 M-F After 9AM and dive till 5 California time.
Have an exceedingly awesome week and stay inspired!
Jonathan (TogaMan)
Thanks Michael! Stouffer himself had many copycats throughout Europe in his lifetime. Sadly he died in the poorhouse. His work enrich the world and still continues to influence! Hopefully I can escape the end he had (which is a big challenge these days!