Roger

  • #14 Camp Fire Bass Ukulele

    My nephew Ryan commissioned this ukulele, and gave me free license to design. It. I had been wanting to build an instrument out of some Black Walnut I had. It was salvaged from a tree next to Katherine’s cousin’s home… Continue reading

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    #14 Camp Fire Bass Ukulele
  • #13 Alice Baritone Harp Ukulele

    This companion piece to the Oz tenor is exactly the same size and shape, but has heavier gauge strings to enable standard DGBE baritone tuning. The harp strings are also tuned correspondingly lower. It has a very mellow, rich sound… Continue reading

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    #13 Alice Baritone Harp Ukulele
  • #12 Oz Tenor Harp Ukulele

    I have always appreciated harp guitars in the hands of Michael Hedges, Muriel Anderson and John Doan, and I often wondered if there was ever such a thing as a harp ukulele. Then I saw one in a photo of… Continue reading

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    #12 Oz Tenor Harp Ukulele
  • #11 Dogwood Concert Ukulele

    Built along with the Celtic uke, this one was for my wife, Katherine. Dogwood is one of her favorite flowers.  It made a nice soundport cutout design, and a pretty peghead inlay. The maple and black edges of the soundport… Continue reading

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    #11 Dogwood Concert Ukulele
  • #10 Celtic Concert Ukulele

    This Curly Maple and Sitka Spruce concert was built in tandem with the Dogwood uke. They are basically junior versions of the Wave and Diamondback ukes, with cutaways, arm bevels, long-scale necks, etc. This instrument was built for a niece,… Continue reading

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    #10 Celtic Concert Ukulele
  • #9 Zymurgy 5 String Banjo

    Playing a 22 lb. Banjo can be hard on your back, so I wanted to try building a real, bluegrass banjo with an 8 inch banjolele-sized rim. It has a 20 inch scale fretboard, and I am still experimenting with… Continue reading

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    #9 Zymurgy 5 String Banjo
  • #8 Kingfisher Banjo Ukulele

    I decided to build a banjo uke for myself, and gave it a Kingfisher theme. The shell and recon stone peghead inlay of the Kingfisher is hunting the little abalone fish fret markers. The rim is built of several layers… Continue reading

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    #8 Kingfisher Banjo Ukulele
  • #7 Diamondback Tenor Ukulele

    Built in tandem with the Wave uke, this long scale tenor is a 5 string, with both a low and high G, and is great for strumming. Like the Wave, it features a cutaway, ducted soundport  radiused fretboard, arm bevel… Continue reading

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    #7 Diamondback Tenor Ukulele
  • #6 Wave Tenor Ukulele

    I built this long-scale tenor in tandem with my Diamondback uke. They share the same dimensions and construction features. I built them based on the excellent Advanced Ukulele video course by Jay Lichty and Robbie O’Brien. Firsts for me on… Continue reading

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    #6 Wave Tenor Ukulele
  • #5 Baritone Ukulele

    This was my first all-wood ukulele from scratch. I spent a few days with my brother-in-law, Howard Replogle, in his shop in Washington. He got into lutherie about the same time I did, and had a lot of hands-on professional… Continue reading

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    #5 Baritone Ukulele