Doug Berch

I am currently at the finishing stage of making two CDs and five dulcimers. It is at this stage that my eyes and ears become increasingly more critical of my work.

What began as a burst of creative force transmutes into discernment. The dark side of this process for me is when the critical eye or ear focuses on faults rather than the complete message of the work at hand.

I aspire to do the best work I am capable of yet I also have to have a reasonable expectation of what defines the best work I can accomplish.

And what defines the best work I am capable of executing? Is it the overall design, look, feel and tone of an instrument or that slight imperfection in the finish? Is it the overall experience of a piece of music or that note I sang that seems a little bit off pitch?

Should I leave things as they are because they are working beautifully or redo some aspect of the work because it could be a little better?

Surely it will be even better next time but what about now?

I’m curious to hear from other creative people about their thoughts on this process. Please comment if so inspired.

Woodworker Qing made elaborately carved wooden bell stands.

When others saw the completed bell stands, they were startled and thought they must have been created by supernatural beings.

The Marquis of Lu saw one of them and asked: “What special art (artistic skill) do you have to be able to do this?”

He replied, “Your humble servant is merely an artisan. What special artistic ability could I have?

However, I do use one system.

When I’m about to create a bell stand, I’m careful not to expend too much of my vital energy, so I have to first settle my mind and heart in calmness.

For three days I prepare myself by giving up on any ideas of praise or rewards for my work.

The next five days I prepare by not being concerned whether my work will be criticized or considered to be not perfect enough.

Then for seven days I prepare myself by forgetting about the prescribed shapes of things including the shape of my own body. By that time I’ve lost all consideration as to what the royal court would demand of me, concentrate completely on my task, and outside influences just disappear.

Then I enter the mountain forests and observe the naturalness of the heavens. By seeing that all the shapes around me are complete of themselves, I can envision a completed bell stand. At that point I can actually start working with my hands, but not until then.

It’s because I use the heavens to fit perfectly with the heavens that some suspect my tools were used by spirits. That’s all there is to it!”

-Chuang Tzu

Many instruments with flat tops and backs actually have some slight arching built into them. The arching ads stiffness and strength to the thin top and back.

On guitars the soundboard must not only create the sound of the instrument but it also must resist the tension of six strings. Traditional dulcimer designs usually employ the finger board carrying most of the string load, however some slight arching of the top and back can allow me to make them thinner and more resonant.

The arching also helps the top and back resist warping when the humidity changes. I consider a certain amount of “movement” of the top and back to be a part of the nature of a lightly built instrument. I prefer this to having an instrument that is built like a brick as they usually sound as good as a brick!

First I take the rough sawn brace stock and plane it to thickness using a bench hook and a plane.

My method for arching the braces is simple. I have a jig that is nothing more than a piece of wood slightly thinner than the thickness of my braces. The ends of one edge are a little higher than the center. I figured out the proportions of the jig by eye, experimentation, and feel and to get the desired amount of arching.

The hole in the jig serves an important purpose; it allows me to hang the jig on a nail so I don’t sweep it up and throw it in the scrap bin!

I put the jig in the front vice of my bench. The straight part goes against the bottom of the vice and the edge with the elevations faces up.

I place the brace on top of the jig with the quartered grain running perpendicular to the floor. I use a block of wood to press the center of the brace down till it touches the low part of the jig. I hold it there with one hand and tighten the vice with the other.

Since the jig is a little thinner than the braces the result is a brace that is firmly held in the vice and bowed down at the center. The surface facing up and out of the vice is the surface that will be glued to the instrument after the brace leaves the jig.

Since the center of the brace is pressed down the ends are higher. I plane the top of the brace flat. Once this surface is flat I open up the vice and the planed surface of the brace springs up into a perfect arch that is ready to be glued to the soundboard.

Here you can see the planed surface of the brace against a straight edge.

Notice that the ends of the brace gradually taper away from the center. It is not easy to see in the photograph but it is there. This is the slight arch that I have aimed for.

The other day I was thinking it would be nice to have a small and accurate table saw. I have a portable contractors saw that works well but I wanted a tool that had the feeling of solidity that only cast iron provides. An aluminum table might be great for a picnic but it feels lacking on my table saw.

So imagine my surprise when I saw a listing for an old Craftsman table saw less than a mile from my door!

The price was reasonable and the saw now sits in my garage awaiting some tender loving care to bring it back to a better life.

It works! The model is #103.23834 and it probably dates to the early 1950’s. It takes an 8″ blade and has a 1 hp Dayton motor. It also came with the rip fence and miter gauge.

The table is rusty but salvageable.

Some parts are frozen so I see a can of WD40 in my future.

It is heavy and solid and from the front it looks like a radio! How cools is that!

Here is a picture from the back. I’ll probably mount the who thing to a bench once I overhaul it

I was able to find a copy of the original manual thanks to the friendly folks at the Old Wood Working Machines site. The manual will be of great help when restoring the saw.

I’ll be using this saw for small scale work so I won’t miss the iron side wings but if you live nearby and have some to spare I might be interested

This morning I posted about some wood I was going to resaw. Some of the wood shown in today’s earlier post has been resawn as well as a few other boards.

Some of the boards needed to be flattened before they could be resawn. For the ones with a lot of twist I prefer using a wooden jack plane. It is light and glides beautifully across the wood. This plane has a fairly fine mouth for a jack plane and the blade is honed with a back bevel making the cutting edge around 55 degrees. I can quickly level and smooth these 32 inch boards. I occasionally make a pass or two with a #7 plane to determine the high spots.

Here is the bandsaw in the garage set up for resawing. I haven’t hooked up the dust collector yet. It helps but it is still a very dusty process.

And here is the resawn wood stacked on my bench. I’ll give it a few weeks to acclimate to my shop before being joined, brought to final thickness and turned into dulcimers.

Now I’m going to sweep up the sawdust, empty the dust collector and shower away the sawdust.

It was a good afternoon.

When I shop for wood I never know what I’ll come home with. Usually I plan on getting something specific but often I find that what I want isn’t available. Sometimes I’m lucky and come home with something unexpected and wonderful.

That is how I came to acquire this Curly Sapele or Mahogany. I’m not quite sure which it is but I find them to be interchangeable in workability and tone.

And here’s and interesting piece of somewhat Curly Walnut. It will yield some fine quartered billets.

I am happy it was not steamed as so much Walnut is these days. I don’t mind the sapwood and I like the natural colors. Steaming evens the tone of the sapwood and heartwood but it takes away a lot of the more subtle colors. The photograph doesn’t show some of the more subtle hues.

And last but not least some Curly Cherry with wide curl. Nothing magnificent but beautiful none the less.

I prefer finding thick timber. I get more book matched sets and less waste than I do resawing 4/4 or 5/4 but I take what I can get.

I have been writing this post primarily to avoid cleaning the shop this morning so I’d best get to work!

Music, the word we use in our everyday language, is nothing less than the picture of our Beloved. It is because music is the picture of our Beloved that we love music. But the question is what is our Beloved and where is our Beloved? Our Beloved is that which is our source and our goal; and what we see of our Beloved before our physical eyes is the beauty which is before us; and that part of our Beloved not manifest to our eyes is that inner form of beauty of which our Beloved speaks to us. If only we would listen to the voice of all the beauty that attracts us in any form, we would find that in every aspect it tells us that behind all manifestation is the perfect Spirit, the spirit of wisdom.”

“As to what we call music in everyday language, to me architecture is music, gardening is music, farming is music, painting is music, poetry is music. In all the occupations of life where beauty has been the inspiration, where the divine wine has been poured out, there is music. But among all the different arts, the art of music has been specially considered divine, because it is the exact miniature of the law working through the whole universe. For instance, if we study ourselves we shall find that the beats of the pulse and the heart, the inhaling and exhaling of the breath are all the work of rhythm. Life depends upon the rhythmic working of the whole mechanism of the body. Breath manifests as voice, as word, as sound; and the sound is continually audible, the sound without and the sound within ourselves. That is music; it shows that there is music both outside and within ourselves.”

“Many in the world take music as a source of amusement, a pastime, and to many music is an art and a musician an entertainer. Yet no one has lived in this world and has thought and felt, who has not considered music as the most sacred of all arts, for the fact is that what the art of painting cannot clearly suggest, poetry explains in words; but that which even a poet finds difficult to express in poetry is expressed in music. By this I do not only say that music is superior to art and poetry, but in point of fact music excels religion; for music raises the soul of man even higher than the so-called external forms of religion.

By this it must not be understood that music can take the place of religion; for every soul is not necessarily tuned to that pitch where it can really benefit by music, nor is every music necessarily so high that it will exalt a person who hears it more than religion will do. However, for those who follow the path of the inner cult, music is essential for their spiritual development. The reason is that the soul who is seeking for that is in search of the formless God. Art no doubt is most elevating, but at the same time it contains form; poetry has words, names suggestive of form; it is only music which has beauty, power, charm and at the same time can raise the soul beyond form.”

“I gave up my music because I had received from it all that I had to receive. To serve God one must sacrifice what is dearest to one; and so I sacrificed my music. I had composed songs; I sang and played the vina; and practicing this music I arrived at a stage where I touched the Music of the Spheres. Then every soul became for me a musical note, and all life became music. Inspired by it I spoke to the people, and those who were attracted by my words listened to them, instead of listening to my songs.

Now, if I do anything, it is to tune souls instead of instruments; to harmonize people instead of notes. If there is anything in my philosophy, it is the law of harmony: that one must put oneself in harmony with oneself and with others. I have found in every word a certain musical value, a melody in every thought, harmony in every feeling; and I have tried to interpret the same thing, with clear and simple words, to those who used to listen to my music.

I played the vina until my heart turned into this very instrument; then I offered this instrument to the divine Musician, the only musician existing. Since then I have become His flute; and when He chooses, He plays His music. The people give me credit for this music, which in reality is not due to me but to the Musician who plays on His own instrument.”

Most of the work I do involves light trimming, fitting and the shaping of parts. I prefer paring chisels for the precision, reach and control they offer.

I was lucky enough to find a few old Buck cranked and straight paring chisels at an antique mall a few years ago. These chisels are great for shaping braces, trimming joints, cleaning up surfaces, etc. I also have a few old bench chisels that work well as paring chisels.

There are tasks that would not be appropriate for the long, thin blade of a paring chisel such as chopping out end grain or making heavy cuts to remove a lot of waste. For these tasks I use bench chisels. I have a few Stanley 750 chisels that I reach for in these situations. I also use them in place of paring chisels when a shorter chisels seems more comfortable and easier to manage. I also have a 4mm chisel that is perfect for getting into nooks and crannies.

There are other chisels I regularly reach for, some with names on them and some of unknown origin. If they fit the task and hold an edge then I am happy.

I have found that grinding the edge to 25 or so degrees works pretty well for just about everything I do. The edges hold up well and work fine for a variety of cuts.

And now for your listening pleasure…..

“Jew’s Harp Bill” Parkophone Records E6357 - The Greene Brothers:

The dulcimer album is almost done and the hammered dulcimer album is in the home stretch. Mastering should begin in a few weeks.

I’ve been recording with Glenn Brown at Glenn Brown Productions in East Lansing. The sound is wonderful, true audiophile quality.