Category: Backpacker Violins and Pochettes
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The Use of Tuned Porting in Modern Stringed Instruments
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. Tuned porting has been a critical aspect of audio system speaker enclosure design for many years. Only recently, has the idea of porting beyond what is provided by the sound holes, been considered in the design of musical instruments, particularly stringed instruments, plucked as well as bowed. With stringed musical…
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Solving the “how do you hold this thing” problem with historic pochettes
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. We sell an 18th type pochette (pocket fiddle) under the Neil Gow Pochette and Thomas Jefferson Pochette names, depending on the sales venue. This instrument is EXTREMELY popular, especially among our customer/friends in Japan. The original instruments on which our replica is based, as with all historic pochettes,…
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Video of Dr. Rickert Installing Pure Gut Strings: UPDATE
Yesterday (Saturday, June 11) we shot most of the video of Dr. Rickert of Don Rickert Design installing 18th Century type gut strings (copper wound g string and unwound pure gut d', a' and e' strings) on a an 1780s style pochette. We were also shooting video for a demonstration of the use of basso continuo fiddle accompaniment using our new…
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Video of Dr. Rickert Installing Pure Gut Strings on a Pochette
On Saturday, June 11, we will be shooting video of Dr. Rickert of Don Rickert Design installing 18th Century type gut strings (copper wound g string and unwound pure gut d', a' and e' strings) on a short bodied (but 4/4 playable scale) pochette. The principles apply to the installation of gut strings on any fiddle. The demonstration will…
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Kira and Her Adventurer IId Travel Violin Save the Day at the Abbey in Conques
Before Our Story, A Little Bit About the 1,000 Year-Old Sainte-Foy Abbey Church The Sainte-Foy Abbey (of the Benedictine Order) Church in Conques, France (the Southern part of France) was a popular stop for pilgrims on their way to Santiago de Compostela, in what is now Spain. Its construction began sometime in the 1020s and…
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A Regular Fiddle with the Innovative Tailpiece-Chin Rest Combo
Introduction As part of Don Rickert Lutherie's search for the perfect chin rest for our backpacker fiddles and travel fiddles, particularly our 2-inch wide Mountaineer Backpacker Fiddle, we found a unique accessory from the innovative Dov Schmidt, which combines the function of the tailpiece AND the chin rest. To our amazement, this Tailpiece-Chinrest Combo works extremely…
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The Solution to the Chin Rest Problem on Backpacker Violins and Fiddles
Our continuous improvement efforts related to the Backpacker and Travel Fiddles by Don Rickert Lutherie (the Neil Gow 21C2 Travel Violin, the NEW Neil Gow 22C Travel Violin, Adventurer IId Travel Violin and Mountaineer Backpacker Fiddle) has kept us on a relentless search for a truly usable chin rest solution. Customers who otherwise love these small, durable and sonorous instruments have…
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Pochettes, Backpacker Fiddles and Ergonomics: A Short Primer
What is a Pochette? A pochette was a violin-like instrument of the 17th and 18th Centuries that was small enough in girth to fit into a longish sheath sewn into one's coat. The sheath came to be known by the instrument's name: "pochette". This is where the modern English word "pocket" comes from. Pochettes were…
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