Give the man a cigar, he has a brilliant musical idea
Greg shows how easy it is to play some famous riffs and he reckons anyone can do it as the guitars are tuned to produce basic chords without the need for complex fingering.
“These guitars and why they work and why they are popular now is they are opentuned,” he said.
“It’s also about the slide,” Greg says of the metal cover he wears on his little finger. “And getting the lovely resonance from the slide.”
His fretless guitars, which are all individually created from scratch, are tuned to G, which is the open chord.
Moving the slide down the guitar handle produces the other major chords.
Most blues music features simple, three-chord progressions and cigar box guitars are closely associated with singing the blues in the American South during the Great Depression of the 1930s.
“Muddy Waters and Robert Johnson cut their teeth on these,” Greg says.
A music lover who has been a furniture maker for the past 20 years, he says moving into making guitars was a natural progression born from the desire to do something different.
After being encouraged by his early creations, he took the instruments to musical experts for reassurance of their quality.
There is a growing cigar box guitar scene in Victoria but now, after making about 90, Greg needs to push into other markets.
“I need that international demand, and the international focus. For me, that’s the next step,” he said.
For more details go to brookwoodguitars.com.