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estebanana -> And now for something completely different....... (May 9 2010 9:50:35)
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This an electric Saz I maintain for Trey Spruance the leader of the band Secret Chiefs 3. My buddy John Beal created it by grafting a Turkish saz neck onto a Danelectro Longhorn hollow body electric. John is actually a full time Russian orthodox priest who I went to college with. He messes around with guitar design, but is mainly a priest.
He made a fragile connection between the body and the neck and last year when Trey was on tour with his band the neck snapped off on stage in Frankfurt Germany. Trey was holding the neck to the body with one hand and finished the set that way. This particular guitar/saz is famous and has become a kind of trademark of Trey's band Secret Chiefs 3. If you Youtube SC3 you can see lots of live footage of him playing it in concert.
I rebuilt the body neck connection and simplified it. I cut the headstock down and created a more guitar like peg head by grafting two pieces on each side and reshaping them. I installed a set of off the shelf Fender Strat tuning machines and restrung it with heavier electric guitar strings. Before I cut the headstock down the overall length of the guitar was 48''! there was not a case that could handle the guitar and Trey used to take it on tour wrapped in blankets! I cut 4.5 inches off and remade the headstock. I took the guitar over to Fat Dog's music shop in Berkeley CA and asked the guys what they had laying around that this instrument would fit in. Turns out a Gibson 335 case fit it like a glove.
Trey came to pick it up two weeks ago before SC3 left on the current tour of Eastern Europe and Istanbul. I've received several Facebook notes from his fans saying they were glad the saz-guitar was back in action. I'm going to make one of these for myself, eventually. They are a blast to play.
Check it out
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