A radio show just for us.

[Kim]

Instrument making is usually a solitary pursuit, but when makers gathered in Albany on the south coast of Western Australia to discuss techniques and celebrate the craft, there was a palpable sense of collaboration and common purpose. Robyn Johnston spent time with local members of the Great Southern Lutherie and the visiting master makers, exploring their passion for a complex and rewarding endeavour and discovering what happens when amateurs overcome their 'wood fear' and create something precious.


http://www.abc.net.au/rn/intothemusic/default.htm

Enjoy my good friends

[sebastiaan56]

Lets hear it for RN,

Sebastiaan

[Luke]

Great program had a listen Saturday night and fond it compelling.
It will be repeated on Friday afternoon I think around 3pm after the daily planet.

My radio is tuned to radio National all the time if you want to be informed
about the world and often discover some different music you can't go wrong.
I am a big fan an glad its part of our ABC.
Cheers

[John Maddison]

Hi all

Have just registered with ANZLF!

I had the very good fortune to be part of the original group of Albany-based makers who took part in Playmakers '08, at which we were interviewed by Robyn Johnson for the Radio National show mentioned here. We managed to get a website published just prior to the broadcast ... visitors can check us out at http://www.gslutherie.org - it's a start, and definitely a work in progress. We're always happy to post reciprocal links to other lutherie groups' websites.

Playmakers funding has been assured until 2011, and the 2009 event will have a Classical theme. Worth a trip to Albany if you get a chance in February each year. Playmakers is part of the Perth International Arts Festival (PIAF).

Chiz

John FM

[Kim]

Gday John,

Welcome to the ANZLF. Great to have you with us and please feel free to let the rest of your sou'wester mates know we are here and maybe place a link to us on your site. After all, the more we share, the more we learn ah.

I live just south of Perth and very nearly made it to Playmakers this year with Tim Spittle. We were going to share the car trip down but life happened and I had to give it a miss. Sure am disappointed though because, from the RN doco, it seems I missed out on a great get together of a very nice group of builders.

Must also take my hat of to Robyn Johnson for the way she conducted the interviews, the show gave some good insight into the obsession and has given me some amo to use on my own suffering missus

Anyhow, don't be afraid to show us your work and join in the topics, also, we do group buys on various luthericaly related booty from time to time to give us a bit of a price break through volume and combined shipping from the USA. If you and the rest of the lads from Great Southern Lutherie want to jump on this at any time, I am sure you will be more than welcome.

Cheers

Kim

[John Maddison]

Cheers Kim and thanks for the warm welcome.

Yes, I will surely add ANZLF to our links page tonight, and rest assured will also extend the info in your last post to the rest of the crew. Our website History page pretty much explains how we came into being, and even though the original group of 12 (?) people who got together to make first instruments has dwindled a bit, we are now a core group of 6 to 8 makers, all at different levels of expertise ... where we regard Maurie Howlett, featured in the RN docco, as our mentor (and jig-maker extroadinaire!). Maurie is a regular observer of the ANZL Forum and put me onto you guys, but not sure if he has registered yet.

The plan for our website is to publish various How-To pages, and add a lot more gallery content in the months/years ahead.

Great news to hear about your mass purchasing initiatives - good plan, I guess info on forthcoming deals gets posted here (somewhere?). Say hi to our buddy TimS next time you see him - it was great to meet him at Playmakers last February.

John FM

[Bob Connor]

G'day John and welcome to the forum.

I had a good look at your website and it sounds like you have a great community of builders there in Southern WA.

There's generally an announcement or calls for expressions of interest in group buys and they've proved to be always popular and have saved us all a heap of dollars, particularly with postage.

From memory we've done Adirondack Spruce tops, Allied truss rods, Indian Rosewood back and sides, carbon fibre neck re-inforcements and earlier on, the admins did a Gurian group buy on purflings and bridge pins.

Hope to see a few more of you folk drop in.

Cheers

Bob

[John Maddison]

Gday Bob and thanks also for the welcome.

Will pass on the info about bulk buying to the rest of the crew.

I have posted a link on our site to ANZLF (see http://gslutherie.org/html/links.htm) and will encourage other local makers to drop in and have a look around.

Re the many great performances at Playmakers '08 in Albany, most notably by Steve Gilchrist and Bluegrass virtuoso Mike Compton, you might wanna check out this posting on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXO2Z1wX0_M

The guy who posted it, 'dasspunk' travelled around Oz with Mike and posted a heap of pics on the Mandolin Cafe site via his blog at http://dasspunk.com/ (scroll down to 'OZ Update' heading).

Cheers all

John FM