Photos by Jon GrundyClick to enlarge. Capping the many jaw-dropping elements of the Wall-Board is a Pelham Blue finish – one of Gibson’s most-desirable custom colors in the ’60s.
In the world of “guitarcheology,” it’s well-documented that the truly interesting stuff – prototypes, one-offs, custom instruments – usually surface close to the source. For instance, in the 1970s, Fender prototypes walked into guitar shops in Orange County, California. D’Angelicos are typically still within a few hours of New York City, as they were almost all custom-built for local players. And, if you’re looking for rare and historically significant Gibson pieces, they tend to float out of the Michigan woods near Kalamazoo, where they were made.
Over the years, local collectors have seen amazing Gibson instruments turn up in western Michigan; stories of Les Paul sunbursts and Super 400s and J-200s that once belonged to Gibson employees or professional musicians “supplied” with the company’s finest. In addition to production models and vintage collectibles pieces, the area has yielded numerous prototypes, oddities, and custom instruments made by employees in – or out of – the factory.
Such is the case with the Wall-Board, a guitar that emerged at a guitar show a half-decade ago, causing a stir among those who thought they’d seen everything. Yet another Gibson oddity, it’s one of the wildest instruments to leave the factory during the company’s golden era.
While the Wall-Board may look like Gibson’s answer to the LaBaye 2×4, its 1964 date stamp puts it ahead by several years. It has a neck-through-center chunk of wood from a first-generation Firebird and its uncut headstock retains that model’s six-in-line/banjo-tuner configuration. Other unusual features include a retractable strap, Vari-Tone circuit, pushbutton pickup selector, and a custom-made case that looks like it could contain a hunting rifle.
Unlike so many stories involving one-off or oddball guitars, there’s virtually no challenge in determining the source, since the builder put his name all over the instrument (and its case) via inscribed plaques; Rendal “Ren” Wall was a Gibson employee well-known in the area and the son of Rem, who for 30 years led the Green Valley Jamboree band on Kalamazoo TV station WKZO and, circa 1939, went to work making violin bows at Gibson. As a noted musician, Rem was often asked by management for input on design innovations like the humbucking pickup as it was being developed by Seth Lover.
This button engages a boost circuit borrowed from Gibson’s contemporary EB-3.
Ren Wall began working for Gibson in 1960 and remained onboard until the Kalamazoo plant closed in ’82. A few years later, he became one of the founding employees of the Heritage Guitar Company, which took over the ground floor of the original Gibson factory. Still with Heritage, he has spent more than 50 years in the same building! Wall is also known for being the man who played an original Gibson Moderne – the mythical great white whale of vintage guitars. After borrowing it from Gibson’s “morgue” storage facility in the early ’60s, he played the guitar in a local theater production of Bye Bye Birdie, then returned it to the morgue.
Today, the Wall-Board belongs to an employee of Michigan-based ThroBack Electronics, which makes strings, effects, and pickups using machines like those originally used at Gibson, including a bobbin winder that sat unused at Heritage. The story illustrates the family element of the guitar-making community in western Michigan, and we recently spoke with Wall to learn more about the Wall-Board.
How’d you get the idea to build the Wall-Board?
Well, when you’re young, you have different ideas! When I first started with Gibson, I was in the mood to do something different because I was there. Everybody was throwing out ideas, so I thought I’d try one. I first made what was called the Eighth-Note Guitar. Ever heard of that?
There were photos; it’s another Gibson oddball – oversized and shaped like a musical note. You were responsible for that?
I remember buying the big chunk of wood from Julius Bellson, who was Gibson’s treasurer at the time. I paid quite a bit of money for that big block of mahogany. I had this idea for interchangeable fingerboards with different scale lengths – you just popped ’em in. Also, you could change the pitch of the neck from where the fingerboard joined the body on the back. The other arm held the tension of the strings, the fingerboard was free-pitching – you just strung it up and you could change the action from the back of the heel.
So, after the Eighth-Note guitar, you started on the Wall-Board…
It was just a body [a Firebird neck-through center section] – I didn’t have any horns.
The Wall-Board’s retractable strap is built into the tail end of the body.
How long did it take?
I imagine it was a year, year and a half, maybe two years after I started fiddling around with the idea; I put a stamp on the back when I completed it. It was painted Pelham Blue and I left the peghead square, and if I remember right, it had a couple [Firebird mini-humbucking] pickups. I swiped the circuitry from the bass we had back then, with the pushbutton tone control… then I put a strap inside, so it would roll up and hide, put a Bigsby on it, and cut out a little plastic pickguard. I can’t remember who made the case.
What gave you the idea for the retractable strap?
I think I was trying to put as much as I could on that small body. I said, “Hey, there’s some room for something like a Boy Scout belt.” I just figured I’d roll it up inside, and it had little teeth that would hook to the strap button.
It seems like a real rock-and-roll guitar, but you’ve always been a Country-Western player…
Yes, I played country with my dad. I’ve played professional steel guitar, drums, bass, guitar, and sang. People who used to watch our TV show for 37 years and our two radio shows for 40 years, most of them are now in nursing homes, so I’ve performed in some of them. I’m continuing, still entertaining.
Wall used a stamping tool to mark the back of the headstock, “Designed and built by Rendal Wall Jan of 1964.”
How much did you play the Wall-Board?
I don’t remember ever playing it out. I think it was something I wanted to say that I built – a guitar that was wild and out there. The Eighth-Note guitar was the same way.
What do you remember about playing the Moderne?
I played it in a Bye, Bye Birdie presentation at the Barn Theater. I could have bought that thing for 50 bucks! But it was so ugly nobody wanted it. I put it back up in the “morgue” and later, when Norlin bought Gibson, they cleaned out all that stuff, and I don’t know who got it. I didn’t have anything to do with it after Bye Bye Birdie. It wasn’t my style – I was more into the country stuff, and steel guitar and bass.
You’ve had a long, successful career in guitar building with both Gibson and Heritage.
I started at Gibson on September 9, 1960. After a while, I became foreman of 14 cleaners, 24 fret filers, two inspectors, and I was the last guy in the booth before they were shipped out. That’s what I did for quite a few years, and then I started developing things. I had a lot of ideas back in the days with Gibson; I developed the TP-6 tailpiece, the sliding pickup for the Grabber bass, the top-adjust Tune-O-Matic, the Sustain Sisters for the 347 – B.B. King had those on his Lucille, which I delivered to him. I invented several things before they finally put me in engineering, and off we went.
I left Gibson in ’82 and started working at Heritage in ’85, where I developed the double VIP electronics and some other things. I never got rich on any of this stuff, but had a lot of fun because I just loved guitar so much; I still do, and I’m still working at Heritage. I’m 74 and have close to a million guitars under my belt. We counted one day! I don’t think anybody else can say that.
The Wall-Board may be a footnote in Gibson history, but it’s a unique instrument with a great story. It’s fun to speculate about how many oddball Gibson-related instruments could surface from the woods of Michigan. Could someone show up one day with the Moderne? Stranger things have happened.
Special thanks to Mark Huizenga and Jerry Douthett.
This article originally appeared in VGJune 2016 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Few things are as satisfying as a guitar with a good story to tell. Some vintage guitars might be beautiful and/or valuable, but boring as Paris Hilton – the guitar equivalent to a vacuous model with zero personality. Others, either by virtue of the lives they’ve led or the story of their origin, are way more fascinating. And if some have a good story to tell, the story of two special Paul Bigsby instruments is the War And Peace of vintage guitar tales!
In the last few years, there has been renewed interest in the guitars built by Paul “P.A.” Bigsby, inventor of the famed Bigsby vibrato. It’s long been known that Paul Bigsby made the first “modern” solidbody electric guitar for Merle Travis in 1947. It’s only been recently, however, that historians have begun to realize just how few of these solidbody electrics Bigsby actually made.
A vintage postcard showing Myrtle trees of the Oregon coast.
As the story goes, Bigsby ran a one-man operation and resisted mass production, turning out one instrument a month (the majority of which were steel guitars and pedal steel guitars, but there were also small numbers of solidbody electrics, re-necked acoustics, mandolins and tenor guitars) for customers who were willing to pay top dollar for his instruments and who didn’t mind waiting anywhere up to two years for delivery after making their down payment. It only makes sense that within this history of Paul Bigsby’s guitars, there would be one odd case that defied everything that we have previously known about Paul Bigsby and how he operated.
Dale and Harry Granstrom grew up along the Oregon coastline in the logging town of North Bend. They were both wild about music, mostly Western swing and country, and played in local combos after World War II. Dale was mostly a steel guitarist, but played guitar and upright bass; older brother Harry played accordion, along with drums and a little guitar. In early 1949, when the brothers saw Tex Williams’ Western swing band at The Dutch Mill, in Roseburg, Dale was blown away by Tex’s virtuoso steel guitarist, the legendary Joaquin Murphy – and the sound of his custom-made Bigsby steel guitar. Almost immediately, Dale placed an order for his very own triple-neck Bigsby steel guitar, and received it shortly after, in September of ’49. This began a phone friendship between Dale and Paul Bigsby that would last more than a decade.
An early picture of the myrtlewood Bigsby guitars, with their original tailpieces. Dale Granstrom is in the middle.
Bigsby has been described as one of those guarded old men – either really friendly or really cranky depending on how he viewed the intentions of the person he was dealing with. Apparently, he took to Dale Granstrom right away, and they remained in contact after Dale ordered his steel guitar.
Dale and Harry were woodworkers, working in a factory making souvenirs out of a local exotic wood from the Myrtle tree. Myrtlewood, as the legend has it, is found in only two places on earth – the Holy Land and on the coast between southern Oregon and northern California.
Dale (left) and Harry Granstrom onstage, circa 1955. Chuck Skog holds the five-string bass. Note the guitars have their Bigsby vibratos.
Dale had the idea to construct a couple of electric guitars from myrtlewood – one for himself and one for Harry. Dale called Paul Bigsby and asked for help building them. Surprisingly – and this seems to be the only time that Bigsby ever agreed to such an idea – Bigsby agreed.
Through 1950, Dale and Harry began stashing away the nicest and most highly figured pieces of myrtlewood that went through their factory, all the while getting ideas from Bigsby about their instruments. Bigsby advised them on such issues as the neck-through construction, headstock angle, scale length, and the like. The brothers already had put together two sets of Epiphone E-stamped tuners they wanted to use, so Bigsby sent a headstock template that was slightly elongated to accommodate the larger tuners. Per Bigsby’s instruction, a non-adjustable truss rod made of 1/4″ x 1/2″ steel was inlaid in the neck. Bigsby sent a pair of 25″-scale Bigsby fingerboards, fretted and bound, ready to be installed.
The brothers chose a body shape unmistakably influenced by the Fender Broadcaster, but slightly larger and with more curves. Throughout ’51 they worked on the bodies and necks. Many experts have looked at this instrument and can’t believe it was somebody’s first guitar. The fact is Dale and Harry Granstrom were already professional woodworkers, and took their time selecting woods and carefully constructing the guitars.
The Granstrom brothers (Harry died in a construction accident in ’69) appear to have been ahead of their time – while myrtlewood was an unheard of timber for guitar manufacture 57 years ago, today, the difficulty obtaining good tone woods has meant wider acceptance of myrtle as a tonewood for acoustic-guitar sides and backs. Companies such as Taylor and Breedlove offer myrtlewood acoustics, and a dozen smaller luthiers are using the wood extensively.
When the Granstrom instruments were ready for finishing, the brothers sent the guitars to Bigsby’s workshop in Downey, California, where Bigsby installed pickups, hardware, strap hooks, wiring harnesses, and pickguards. He also finished the instruments by applying Bigsby decals to the headstocks (though rarely seen, Bigsby used water decals on the front of his single-neck lap steels and early instrument cases; he later changed to gold-foil stickers). There were also small decals that read “Approved By Bigsby” on the headstock. The instruments were finished in late 1951, and featured in a local newspaper article titled “And Now It’s Myrtlewood For Guitars!” in the January 7, 1952, edition of TheCoos Bay Times.
The first myrtlewood bass and guitar. Note the unusual handrest for the bass and the question-mark-shaped Merle Travis arm on the guitar’s Bigsby vibrato.
The brothers used the instruments in their band, letting various others play them whenever the brothers were playing steel guitar, accordion, or drums. When the Fender electric bass (and to a lesser extent, the Audiovox bass – made in Seattle, a short hop from the Granstrom brothers stomping ground) began making the rounds of the Western swing and Hillbilly bands of the region, Dale knew instinctively that he should think about making a electric bass from myrtlewood.
Again, they enlisted Bigsby’s help, though to a lesser extent than on the guitars. Bigsby supplied a finished 25″-scale fingerboard, as he had on the guitars, but Dale used a blade pickup from a Kay electric bass (model K5965), and various other parts obtained through mail order, to make a five-string(!) electric bass in the summer of ’54. Dale remembers the tuners had to have custom elongated key shafts to accommodate the unusual design. When the instrument was done, Dale sent Bigsby a picture of the instrument, and Bigsby sent up another water decal to put on the headstock of the bass. As far as we have been able to ascertain, this is the only electric bass that Paul Bigsby ever had any direct involvement in – not to be confused with the two Bigsby tenor guitars that are known to exist (though there has been at least one fake Bigsby electric bass to surface in recent years).
The myrtlewood Bigsby five-string electric bass, built in 1954. Note the myrtlewood handle on the handmade case!
The group’s bass player, Chuck Skog, used the myrtlewood Bigsby electric five-string bass. As Dale remembers, like any short-scale electric bass, the intonation was far from perfect, and as a result the group only used the bass for a few years. Skog is deceased, and his son says the bass was not in his possession when he died. Granstrom thinks the bass may be floating around Oregon.
In addition to building the electric bass, Dale and Harry were consistently refining the two guitars they had made in 1951. The biggest modification involved installing two of the brand new Bigsby vibratos on the guitars, which they did circa 1954. A common problem with Bigsby instruments made before the invention of the Bigsby vibrato in ’52 is the neck angle – Bigsby instruments previous to 1952 are virtually flat instruments, with no neck pitch. To solve that issue, all of Bigsby’s post-’52 instruments must have a steeper neck-body angle to accommodate the downward angle of the strings from the bridge to the tailpiece. For the instruments made before ’52, including the myrtlewood guitars – and before the advent of the double-bar B-7 Bigsby – this necessitated digging a channel, or submerging the Bigsby vibrato into the face of the guitar, to give the proper downward angle to make the vibrato work properly. Again, Dale did elegant work, carefully creating a form-fitting cavity in the face of the guitar to make the Bigsby vibrato work perfectly. Originally, the vibratos had the fixed arm Merle-Travis-style handles, but eventually they were replaced with the swivel-arm handle, which debuted in ’56.
Back of the myrtlewood bass shows the figuring of the wood, the unusual tuning keys with extended shafts, and the odd string-through-body ferrule at the other end.
A small but interesting feature of these early Bigsby vibratos involves the rocker bridges that Paul Bigsby gave to Dale and Harry with new vibrato units. The rocker bridge units appear to be an early evolutionary version, and surprisingly work better than the later bridge that is still included with Bigsby vibratos to this day.
Anyone who has tried using a standard Bigsby rocker bridge has noticed the bridge piece has a V fulcrum under each end, which is supported by a flat roller disc underneath it. Ideally, when the player works the vibrato bar, the bridge is supposed to rock back and forth on the fulcrum of the V. Sadly, in real use (especially when playing rock and roll), hand and palm pressure from the player will make the rocking bridge fall forward or backwards, resting on one edge of the V, making the guitar intonate improperly.
The interesting idea behind these early prototype rocking bridges involves threading upside-down oval head straight-slot machine bolts into the bottom of the bridge piece (which is flat on the edges, no V fulcrum) and having the bridge rock on the bottom of the upside-down oval head in a scooped out hole (replete with a slot for the straight-slot of the bolt head to keep it aligned, and from turning in the channel) of the bridge base. A simple idea, but one that works perfectly, unlike the later and more common version of the Bigsby rocking bridge – in fact, it’s one of the unanswered questions of the Bigsby legacy; why Bigsby went with a later idea for the rocker bridge that didn’t work as well as this earlier prototype version.
Another amazing chapter in the story of these guitars came a couple years later, when Gibson and Gretsch began making guitars with humbucking pickups in 1957. Dale called up Paul Bigsby and asked if he was making any of the “new” (humbucking) pickups. Bigsby replied that he was not; as he had basically quit making standard guitars (the last known electric solidbody Bigsby was made in late 1956), but he mentioned that a man named Ray Butts was making replacement humbucking pickups for Bigsby instruments.
Dale wrote to Ray Butts, who ran a workshop in Cairo, Illinois, and inquired about his pickups. Ray Butts, of course, is well known in guitar-geek circles for inventing the Echo-Sonic amplifier in 1955, which was the first amplifier to have a built-in tape echo (and was used by Chet Atkins and Scotty Moore). He was also the man who developed the first humbucking pickup for Gretsch, the Filter’Tron. Ray Butts and Paul Bigsby became acquainted through their involvement with Gretsch and Chet Atkins, and Bigsby visited Butts’ Illinois shop when he drove one of his new Cadillacs home from Chicago to Los Angeles. Bigsby respected Butts enough to recommend Butts’ pickups as replacements for his own – something Bigsby wasn’t known to do.
Chuck Skog, in Western finery, holds the myrtlewood bass in 1954.
When Dale heard back from Butts, he was shocked that Butts was asking $100 each for the humbucking replacement pickups (roughly $700 in today’s money!). Dale could only afford one, so he sold one of his original single-coil Bigsby pickups to a friend (who mounted it in a Telecaster) and installed the Butts humbucker in the neck position of his main myrtlewood guitar. The Butts pickup mounted directly into the Bigsby pickup ring; its cover was cast and polished aluminum, just like the Bigsby’s. In terms of appearance and construction, it’s very similar to an early Gretsch Filter’Tron, but is a custom made creation with a low output to match that of the standard Bigsby pickup.
What makes this story fascinating is the fact that although Bigsby was apparently recommending Butts’ pickups, as of this date, the pickup on the myrtlewood Bigsby is the only Butts humbucking Bigsby replacement pickup known to exist! More than likely, the cost kept away potential customers, and probably only a handful were ever made.
How does the Butts pickup sound? Spectacular. It has the chime and sparkle of the early Filter’Trons, with no high-end loss, and it matches the tone, timbre, and volume of the single-coil Bigsby perfectly.
The myrtlewood story continued to evolve for Dale and Harry Granstrom as the years went on. There was a myrtlewood amplifier cabinet, which housed a Bogen P.A. amplifier head (with a JBL D-130 15″ speaker and an 8″ Diffusicone tweeter) that the brothers used for guitar. More ambitiously, Dale began building a myrtlewood double-10-string pedal steel guitar, based on the Bigsby steel guitar design, but updated to the pedal requirements of the early 1960s. Originally, Dale looked into getting two 10-pole Ray Butts humbuckers installed in the steel (and kept the hand-signed letter from Ray Butts detailing the costs), but eventually decided on Bigsby-style pickups instead. He studied the construction of the pickups on his other instruments, and phoned Paul Bigsby to learn how his pickups were constructed, and made the pickups himself. This beautiful instrument took several years to finish, and only a few years after completing it, Dale wound up trading it in on a new MSA pedal steel. Dale’s attempts in recent years to track down his original 1949 Bigsby steel and his ’60s myrtlewood pedal-steel guitar have not yielded any results. In addition, the second 1951 myrtlewood Bigsby standard guitar got sold off in the late 1950s, and Dale believes it may have wound up in Michigan.
A newspaper article from the Coos Bay Times, January 7, 1952, showing the newly constructed instruments.
In fact, out of all the myrtlewood guitars, basses, steel guitars and amplifiers that Dale and Harry Granstrom made, the only one that is still known to exist is the guitar pictured in this article. Dale kept it all through the years, mostly tucked under the bed, since he was a working pedal steel guitarist, and didn’t play much standard guitar. A few years ago, Dale decided to refinish the guitar, and made a few modifications in the process, as seen in the current photos of the instrument. The two controls mounted on the pick guard always got in Dale’s way, so he drilled two new holes in the body and arranged the four controls in a more standard configuration. The old Epiphone E-stamped tuners finally gave up the ship (anybody with an old Epiphone archtop can relate), so Dale very carefully reworked the headstock by installing a new headstock cap (the Bigsby decal you see here is a replica of the original one), and neatly installing a solid wood plug on the back of the headstock to start over with a new set of tuners (most recently, a vintage set of 1951 Kluson tuners similar to the ones used on early Bigsby guitars have been installed). While us vintage guitar guys wince at his fearlessness in drilling holes in such a historical guitar, to Dale it was simply another improvement, another evolution in the instrument he created nearly 60 years ago.
Dale Granstrom is not the kind of guy who goes around waving his own flag, so it wasn’t until I found Dale as a result of research for the upcoming Bigsby book that the story of these amazing myrtlewood Bigsby instruments came to light. In many ways, with Paul Bigsby and so many of the major players in the evolution of the electric guitar gone from this earth, finding Dale Granstrom was a revelation. With his incredibly interesting sidebar contributions to the electric guitar evolutionary tree, his detailed photos, and his great memory, getting to know Dale (and his wonderful wife, Betty) has been a real honor and privilege. The myrtlewood Bigsby guitar is in itself quite amazing, but the stories this guitar has to tell are even more amazing indeed.
If you have any leads as to where the other myrtlewood guitar, bass, pedal steel, amplifier cabinet, or his original Bigsby steel guitar may be hiding, drop a line to Deke Dickerson at eccofonic@earthlink.net.
This article originally appeared in VG’s March 2009 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Edwards with The Ventures in the ’60s. Dad’s Day archival photo.
Nole Floyd “Nokie” Edwards, former lead guitarist and bassist with The Ventures, passed away March 12 from complications related to ongoing medical problems. He was 82.
Edwards was born May 9, 1935, in Lahoma, Oklahoma, the son of Elbert and Nannie Edwards. He began playing guitar at age five, as well as the mandolin, bass, steel guitar, banjo, and fiddle. His father nicknamed him “Nokie” by combining his given name with “Okie” to form one of the most unusual first names in show business.
After the family relocated to Washington state, Nokie began playing in local country groups and became an in-demand guitarist. Buck Owens, then based in Tacoma, hired him to play lead for his local television show. He played with Owens for over a year before joining a local group known as the Versatones in 1958, which consisted of Don Wilson and Bob Bogle. Edwards joined on bass and the group was renamed The Ventures before recording their first hit, “Walk Don’t Run,” in 1960.
After a couple years as the bass player, Edwards and guitarist Bob Bogle switched roles. The group knew Nokie was a hot guitarist when he joined, and eventually it was agreed he would be an asset as featured soloist. With him on lead and new drummer Mel Taylor joining the ranks, The Ventures were essentially a different band. Many fans agree that the 1963-’68 era represents the high-water mark for the band, and Edwards’ cutting tone (courtesy of their Mosrite Ventures model guitars) along with his hot country-meets-shred licks established him as one of the biggest guitar heroes of the time.
Though the band’s biggest-selling singles came from before and after Edwards’ tenure as lead guitarist, Ventures albums in the mid ’60s sold by the truckload and inspired countless garage bands and up-and-coming guitarists.
Tracks like “Journey To The Stars,” “Diamond Head,” “Slaughter On 10th Avenue,” “Walk Don’t Run ’64,” “Driving Guitars,” “Bumble Bee Twist,” “The 2,000 Pound Bee,” “Ginza Lights,” “House Of The Rising Sun,” “Caravan” and “Surf Rider” (the latter an Edwards composition that decades later was featured on the Pulp Fiction soundtrack) set the bar high, and secured Edwards’ legacy as one of the greatest exponents of guitar instrumental music. The Ventures’ Play Guitar With… series of instructional albums also proved highly influential to thousands of kids in the ’60s.
Edwards was an early experimenter with guitar effects, using a fuzz device made by steel guitarist Red Rhodes on “The 2000 Pound Bee” in 1962, and creating a wah-like effect with a DeArmond Volume and Tone pedal on “Pedal Pusher,” in ’65. He was also an old-school proponent of simple guitar tricks to entertain audiences, such as playing the strings between the bridge and tailpiece (this unusual sound can be heard on many live versions of “Wooly Bully” recorded in the ’60s), and pick-scratching against the wound strings (heard to great effect on “He Never Came Back” on the Ventures In Space album). It can also be said that he took use of the vibrato to new levels, inventing the “dive bomb” technique he used liberally on many Ventures recordings in the ’60s (listen to the Live in Japan ’65 version of “Driving Guitars” to hear an extreme version of this effect).
Edwards left the Ventures in ’68, but returned from ’73 to ’84, after which he would join them off and on over the years, splitting time with guitarist Gerry McGee, and occasionally performing together.
The Ventures had huge success in Japan, where they experienced Beatles-like admiration. In addition to releasing a host of Japan-only recordings, the group toured there for decades, filling large venues. Edwards toured Japan as a solo artist during and after his tenure with The Ventures, and last played there in 2015.
The Ventures were inducted to the Pacific Northwest Hall of Fame in 1999, the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2006, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in ’08. In ’93, they received the Guitar Player magazine Lifetime Achievement Award. All told, they sold more than 100 million records.
In recent years, Edwards had continued health problems and was being treated in Yuma, Arizona, where he lived. He had been hospitalized during the Christmas holiday and eventually succumbed to complications. He is survived by his wife, Judy, sister Louise Jensen, daughter Tina, four stepchildren, 25 grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren, and four great-great-grandchildren. He is interred in a maple urn made by builders at Hitchhiker Guitars. – Deke Dickerson
This article originally appeared in VG‘s June 2018 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Edwards in the ’60s, playing a Ventures model Mosrite.
Nole Floyd “Nokie” Edwards, former lead guitarist and bassist with The Ventures, passed away March 12 from complications related to ongoing medical problems. He was 82.
Edwards was born May 9, 1935, in Lahoma, Oklahoma, the son of Elbert and Nannie Edwards. He began playing guitar at age five, as well as the mandolin, bass, steel guitar, banjo, and fiddle. His father nicknamed him “Nokie” by combining his given name with “Okie” to form one of the most unusual first names in show business.
After the family relocated to Washington state, Nokie began playing in local country groups and became an in-demand guitarist. Buck Owens, then based in Tacoma, hired him to play lead for his local television show. He played with Owens for over a year before joining a local group known as the Versatones in 1958, which consisted of Don Wilson and Bob Bogle. Edwards joined on bass and the group was renamed The Ventures before recording their first hit, “Walk Don’t Run,” in 1960.
After a couple years as the bass player, Edwards and guitarist Bob Bogle switched roles. The group knew Nokie was a hot guitarist when he joined, and eventually it was agreed he would be an asset as featured soloist. With him on lead and new drummer Mel Taylor joining the ranks, The Ventures were essentially a different band. Many fans agree that the 1963-’68 era represents the high-water mark for the band, and Edwards’ cutting tone (courtesy of their Mosrite Ventures model guitars) along with his hot country-meets-shred licks established him as one of the biggest guitar heroes of the time.
Though the band’s biggest-selling singles came from before and after Edwards’ tenure as lead guitarist, Ventures albums in the mid ’60s sold by the truckload and inspired countless garage bands and up-and-coming guitarists.
Tracks like “Journey To The Stars,” “Diamond Head,” “Slaughter On 10th Avenue,” “Walk Don’t Run ’64,” “Driving Guitars,” “Bumble Bee Twist,” “The 2,000 Pound Bee,” “Ginza Lights,” “House Of The Rising Sun,” “Caravan” and “Surf Rider” (the latter an Edwards composition that decades later was featured on the Pulp Fiction soundtrack) set the bar high, and secured Edwards’ legacy as one of the greatest exponents of guitar instrumental music. The Ventures’ Play Guitar With… series of instructional albums also proved highly influential to thousands of kids in the ’60s.
Edwards was an early experimenter with guitar effects, using a fuzz device made by steel guitarist Red Rhodes on “2000 Lb Bee” in 1962, and creating a wah-like effect with a DeArmond Volume and Tone pedal on “Pedal Pusher,” in ’65. He was also an old-school proponent of simple guitar tricks to entertain audiences, such as playing the strings between the bridge and tailpiece (this unusual sound can be heard on many live versions of “Wooly Bully” recorded in the ’60s), and pick-scratching against the wound strings (heard to great effect on “He Never Came Back” on the Ventures In Space album). It can also be said that he took use of the vibrato to new levels, inventing the “dive bomb” technique he used liberally on many Ventures recordings in the ’60s (listen to the Live in Japan ’65 version of “Driving Guitars” to hear an extreme version of this effect).
Edwards left the Ventures in ’68, but returned from ’73 to ’84, after which he would join them off and on over the years, splitting time with guitarist Gerry McGee, and occasionally performing together.
The Ventures had huge success in Japan, where they experienced Beatles-like admiration. In addition to releasing a host of Japan-only recordings, the group toured there for decades, filling large venues. Edwards toured Japan as a solo artist during and after his tenure with The Ventures, and last played there in 2015.
The Ventures were inducted to the Pacific Northwest Hall of Fame in 1999, the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2006, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in ’08. In ’93, they received the Guitar Player magazine Lifetime Achievement Award. All told, they sold more than 100 million records.
In recent years, Edwards had continued health problems and was being treated in Yuma, Arizona, where he lived. He had been hospitalized during the Christmas holiday and eventually succumbed to complications. He is survived by his wife, Judy, sister Louise Jensen, daughter Tina, four stepchildren, 25 grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren, and four great-great-grandchildren. He is interred in a maple urn made by builders at Hitchhiker Guitars. – Deke Dickerson
Semie Moseley, founder of the Mosrite Guitar Company holding the first Mosrite triple-neck, circa 1955. Semie Mosrite with his second tripleneck,performing in 1966 with Ed Sannner (creator of the Mosrite Fuzzrite) on bass and Bakersfield instrumentalist Jellie Sanders. Photos: Andy Moseley and Bob Shade. Grady Martin with his Bigsby double-neck. Photo courtesy Bob Shade.
If you mention doubleneck or multi-neck guitars to your average guitar player, the first thing they’ll likely think of is Jimmy Page playing his Gibson EDS-1275 with Led Zeppelin, or Rick Nielsen and his floor-length five-neck Hamer with Cheap Trick. But few people, even amongst guitar players, realize that the multi-neck guitar has a storied tradition that dates back nearly 100 years.
Why would anyone play a multi-neck guitar? Well, the answer is supposed to be “Because each neck has a different setup that can be used to get different sounds – i.e. 12-string, six-string bass, mandolin, etc.” In reality, though, multi-neck guitar players have always been a different breed – and one thing that can’t be denied is the fact that a multi-neck attracts attention – wanted or not! For every legitimate use of a doubleneck (say, Jimmy Bryant switching back and forth between the six-string neck and 12-string neck on “Stratosphere Boogie”), there have been just as many goofballs who’ve built one with two six-string necks just so they could inlay their first name on the top and their last name on the bottom! Unlike just about every other musical instrument, guitar players have always been willing to do things just for the sake of being different. Have you ever seen a doubleneck violin or a double-throat trumpet? You get my point.
The 1966 Hallmark catalog.
Just where the first multi-neck instrument was built isn’t known, but there’s no doubt the tradition began with the turn-of-the-century popularity of the harp guitar – a popular form of parlor entertainment, and a musical tradition that’s nearly extinct today.
A harp guitar had two necks – one a standard six-string guitar played in the regular way, and another that contained multiple harp strings, or sympathetic “drone” strings meant to be played as accompaniment to the fingerstyle melodies on the regular neck. This came from both the European lute and the zither, which also had several fretted strings and many non-fretted drone strings. When and where the concept was first applied to the Spanish guitar is unknown, but Gibson, the Larson Brothers, Regal, and several other American manufacturers were churning out harp guitars in the first couple decades of the 20th century.
Somewhere along the line, the harp guitar style of playing fell out of popularity, and the acoustic harp guitar mutated. Several examples of multi-neck guitars have surfaced from the 1920s and ’30s with two fretted six-string necks (the purpose of which, it can only be assumed, was for different tunings), or in the case of one very special triple-neck acoustic owned by Herman the Hermit, in California, who performed on the “Hometown Jamboree” country music show based in Los Angeles in the late ’40s and early ’50s) with a custom-made triple-neck from the ’30s that had a six-string neck, a 12-string neck, and a mandolin neck. This guitar is now on display at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville.
Whether or not Herman the Hermit’s visibility on radio and television in L.A. had anything to do with the next step is unknown, but it’s generally accepted that the first electric multi-neck Spanish guitar was a doubleneck built by Paul Bigsby for Nashville studio ace Grady Martin in 1952.
Deke Dickerson’s TNM Custom. Photo: James Steinfeldt.
The Bigsby doubleneck was a revolutionary instrument from a man who did revolutionary things on a daily basis. Paul Bigsby, along with designer and player Merle Travis, is generally known as the father of the modern solidbody guitar, building a guitar in 1947 that influenced the Fender Telecaster, Stratocaster, and the Gibson Les Paul in the years that followed. In addition, he mass-marketed the first successful vibrato unit for the guitar, and is also credited with building the first modern pedals for steel guitar. This was just in the field of guitars; Bigsby also was highly regarded for his Crocker brand of racing motorcycles!
Bigsby had already made multi-neck Hawaiian steel guitars for Speedy West and Joaquin Murphy, so for a non-musician, the idea of making a multi-neck electric Spanish guitar probably didn’t seem at all weird. It was, more likely, simply logical.
The Grady Martin doubleneck (VG, June ’04) had a standard six-string neck on the bottom, and a five- string mandolin neck on top. Although Martin used it on the “Ozark Jubilee” television show from 1952 to ’54, and on hundreds of studio recordings in Nashville, the guitar never received much publicity.
The same could not be said about the next evolutionary step of the electric multi-neck. One of Bigsby’s apprentices was a gospel musician named Semie Moseley, who in 1954 formed Mosrite Guitars with a preacher named Reverend Ray Boatright.
Semie did some of the fancy inlay work on pickguards and necks for Bigsby, and in fact may have done some of the work on Martin’s doubleneck, and he definitely worked on Joe Maphis’ Super 400, as well as a Gibson ES-125 for Larry Collins, both of whom played on the L.A.-based “Town Hall Party.”
When Moseley struck out on his own, he spent a year making a tripleneck guitar he then played at gospel tent revival shows. It was also his calling card as a luthier. Moseley brought the tripleneck to one of Joe Maphis’ shows, and Maphis said if Semie built him a fancy doubleneck, it would be his main guitar. By 1954, Maphis was playing his doubleneck Mosrite on television every Saturday night, giving the guitar enormous publicity and sparking the first bit of commercial interest for Mosrite guitars. A year later, Semie made a doubleneck for Collins, who was half of a brother/sister act called The Collins Kids (and a Maphis protege). Maphis and Collins, with their doubleneck Mosrites on TV, were electrifying, and influenced many young guitar players.
Moseley’s doublenecks had a standard six-string on the bottom, while the top neck was a six string tuned an octave higher, which he called an “octave neck.” In reality, it was a mandolin scale length with strings tuned like a guitar. Moseley later said that he’d heard Les Paul on the radio and figured he had a “tiny guitar” to get those sounds, not realizing that Les was merely speeding up tape!
In the ’50s, Mosrite was essentially a one-man operation, with Moseley making guitars in a shed, using primitive tools. He took custom orders, mostly for gospel and country musicians. One customer was Darrel Jessup, of the “Jessup Brothers Gospel Revival” show, a big-time gospel act on XERF radio in Del Rio, Texas. Jessup ordered an over-the-top tripleneck guitar with a six-string neck, octave neck, and mandolin neck. Truly one of the most radical guitars of all time, this guitar surfaced recently with a story so bizarre it defies belief (see sidebar).
Appearing from left field, also circa ’54, was the Stratosphere Twin from Springfield, Missouri. A doubleneck with a 12-string on top and six-string on bottom, the inventors of the Stratosphere used a tuning system for the 12-string neck that enabled guitar players to play harmony twin lines on one neck; a system that sounded great, but with a not-so-slight drawback: it required players to completely re-learn the guitar!
Predictably, the Stratosphere Twin sank without a trace, though West Coast studio ace Jimmy Bryant used it to great effect on two songs – “Stratosphere Boogie” and “Deep Water” – both released on Capitol in ’54.
Today, the only player who has mastered the Stratosphere tuning system is T.K. Smith, who plays a Stratosphere Twin in his various L.A.-based country-jazz groups such as the Bonebrake Syncopators and the Smith’s Ranch Boys.
Deke Dickerson with his doubleneck Hallmark Swept-Wing. Photo courtesy Bob Shade.
It’s interesting to note that Gibson was the only major guitarmaker to make its own doubleneck, but not until 1958, and only in very limited quantities. Danelectro also jumped on the bandwagon, with a near-useless model with a six-string neck on the bottom and four-string bass on top. Few were sold. Notable players that used the early Gibson doublenecks were country-jazz virtuoso Jimmie Rivers and bluesman Earl Hooker. The Danelectro had to settle for Stan and Dan, a little-known teen act that left behind one memorable album cover!
Other than Gibson and Dano, the multi-neck phenomenon was a West Coast underground revolution taking place in small workshops and garages on a one-at-a-time, custom basis, with brand names such as Kremo-Kustom, Bartell, R.C. Allen, and others in the ’50s and ’60s.
One notable example involved a teenage Moseley apprentice named Terry MacArthur, who lived in the San Fernando Valley in 1958-’59. Moseley was working out of a shed in Granada Hills, just a short distance away from Mac-Arthur’s house. Though MacArthur was in high school, he did a lot of work at the Mosrite shop, helping with various custom guitars and learning the tricks of the trade.
It wasn’t long before MacArthur started making guitars himself. Completely obsessed with the Mosrite-Maphis school of thought, he built at least two doublenecks at Mosrite, both based on the Maphis blueprint. Only one survives today, and next to Maphis’ and Collins’ original Mosrite doublenecks, the TNM Custom doubleneck is the only other example of the early Mosrite style to survive (most, like our tripleneck, were revamped by Semie in the ’60s or ’70s, or simply fell apart). Considering it was built at the Mosrite shop, with Moseley offering hints and suggestions, the TNM Custom is the first cousin of early Mosrites.
When Moseley moved to Bakersfield, California, in the late ’50s, he brought a truckload of lutherie influences with him, and soon Bakersfield became the custom guitar center of the universe for most of the ’60s.
Joe Maphis Larry Collins
Due to demand, Moseley made a number of custom doublenecks, but only a handful were the large-bodied “full gingerbread” versions like the one belonging to Maphis. Most were plain solidbodies with pickups and hardware from his singleneck models. Early Mosrite doublenecks had the octave neck on top, but as the folk-rock scene took off in the mid ’60s with the popularity of groups like the Byrds, the 12-string grew in popularity, and Moseley started mass-producing a doubleneck with a 12-string on top.
Other Bakersfield luthiers got into the act. Bill Gruggett (VG, February ’97), who has been building guitars for nearly 50 years, began making custom doublenecks in the late ’50s. He worked for Mosrite throughout the ’60s, but left to work for the Hallmark Guitar Company.
Hallmark was a short-lived collaboration between Joe Hall and Andy Moseley, both of whom worked for Mosrite. They brought Semie’s sense of left-field genius, and based on a bat-wing body shape designed by a car designer contracted by Bob Bogle of the Ventures, began making one of the legendary obscure guitars, the Hallmark Swept-Wing. Including, you guessed it, the Hallmark Swept-Wing doubleneck!
Hallmark made only a few Swept-Wing doublenecks, including one for “the Doctor,” lead guitarist for the Mamas and Papas, but the newly reborn Hallmark is again making Swept-Wing single-necks and doublenecks (reviewed in VG, April ’04). New president Bob Shade has even made a new doubleneck featuring an LED light show in the necks!
As the ’60s drew to a close, so did the guitar boom spawned by Elvis and Beatles, and many smaller manufacturers like Hallmark and Mosrite went bankrupt. As the ’70s began, only one doubleneck guitar was in production – Gibson’s solidbody. Enter Jimmy Page and the modern history of the multi-neck guitar.
In the world of heavy rock and roll, Page loomed large and the multi-neck guitar would always have a place. Significant players included the aforementioned Nielsen, as well as Cheap Trick bassist Tom Peterson, fusion guitarist John McLaughlin, over-the-top metal guitarist Michael Angelo (who played an unforgettable four-neck guitar with all four necks going in opposite directions), and many of the popular rock guitar players who dabbled with the doubleneck, including Eddie Van Halen, Richie Sambora, Alex Lifeson of Rush, Jimi Hendrix, and others.
Of course, the tradition left behind by Joe Maphis, Grady Martin, and Larry Collins is kept alive today by a group of dedicated vintage doubleneck guitar nuts. As long as there are musicians who dare to be different, it will have a place in the guitar world.
The Jessup/Carroll Mosrite tripleneck. Photo: Michael G. Stewart.
Is more more? A rare Mosrite tripleneck surfaces
In the mid-1950s, an enterprising young man named Semie Moseley was attempting to make a name for himself as a luthier and gospel guitarist. One of the most ambitious and original guitar builders of his time, Moseley learned his craft at Rickenbacker, where he was eventually fired for working on his own designs. This led to a stint with Paul Bigsby, where he made necks and worked on custom inlay and finishing work. When his tenure with Bigsby ended circa 1954, Moseley found himself on his own, with nowhere to build guitars.
He was taken in by neighbor, preacher Reverend Ray Boatright, who let him use his garage and Sears and Roebuck tools. Moseley felt so indebted to the reverend that he named his new company Mos-rite, combining their last names. Some of the very first guitars Moseley made in Boatright’s garage were multi-neck guitars.
Moseley took his new tripleneck to country and gospel shows, hoping to get musicians interested. The first famous artists to use Mosrites were Joe Maphis and Larry Collins, both regulars on the “Western Ranch Party” TV show.
These early multi-neck Mosrites employed luxurious features like decorative plexiglass-plate pickguards, armrest, and jack plates, with a variety of inlay work.
Moseley also specialized in an exquisite sunburst finish that would become his trademark.
When Moseley appeared in person, he’d always play his personal tripleneck. Moseley’s brother, Andy, says there were less than 10 triplenecks ever made, and Semie’s personal triplenecks were destroyed when the Mosrite factory burned down in the ’80s.
Fast forward 50 years…
A phone call from a very excited Mosrite enthusiast named Carter Granat, who tells me that an original Mosrite tripleneck has surfaced at Blue Angel Music in Florida! Signed and dated in the control cavity, “Semie Moseley, 1957,” its owner is Doug Carroll, who brought the guitar in for a bit of setup.
So, how did Mr. Carroll come to possess the instrument? Funny you should ask… In the 1950s, a famous evangelist named J. Charles Jessup led a gospel group called the Jessup Brothers. They would travel the country, leading huge tent revival shows, and like many evangelists of the day, they were wealthy. Jessup was an incredible guitarist and ordered the tripleneck from Moseley in 1957.
Carroll, age 10, was asking for a guitar for his birthday, and thought if he was lucky, might get one of those cool Montgomery Ward guitars from the catalog. When his father, heard this, he contacted Jessup, as he knew Jessup was looking to part with his tripleneck. The elder Carroll was also well-off, financially, and decided to surprise little Doug with what he thought was the Cadillac of guitars! Prior to passing the gift to young Doug, the guitar (which was originally blond in color) was sent to Moseley to be equipped with new pickups, pickguards, and a new premium sunburst finish! Also, the fretboards were sprayed over with black lacquer to hide Jessup’s name inlaid in the boards.
To say that young Doug was surprised is a given, and because he had never had a lesson in his life, it confused him! Never mind the fact he could barely hold it up because it weighed in at over 20 pounds. Feeling dwarfed by this monstrosity, he felt the best thing to do was tuck it under the bed. The guitar stayed there almost 30 years until he decided he’d like to have another go at it. He took it to be re-strung, then decided it might not be the best guitar to learn on, so he put it back under his bed and instead opted to try one of the new Hallmark Swept-Wing single-neck guitars.
It all begs the question, “Is more more?” That’s for you to decide! – Bob Shade Bob Shade is a luthier and Mosrite expert. He is also head of Hallmark Guitars, hallmarkguitars.com.
This article originally appeared in VG‘s April ’05 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
Letritia Kandle with the National Grand Letar; note the front panel’s rising-sun motif, which was changed after the U.S. went to war against Japan.
Run down the list of early electric-guitar innovators and an all-male group typically comes to mind – Les Paul, Alvino Rey, Charlie Christian, Merle Travis, and the like. However, Letritia Kandle deserves to be on the list, as well – her 1937 Grand Letar being the first “console” steel guitar and the first steel with more than two necks, its built-in amplifier was also the first guitar amp to use two speakers, and it boasted a series of tuning advancements that pre-dated the modern pedal steel. Perhaps most incredible, though, was its lighted front, sides, and fretboards!
* * * *
The story is really about two people, Kandle and Paul Warnik, a steel-guitar historian/collector who was haunted by a photo in Tom Wheeler’s American Guitars showing a young woman from decades past posed in front of a multi-neck steel guitar. Its caption reads, “Teacher Letritia Kandle poses with National’s Grand Letar Console Steel.”
Though he looked, Warnik could find no information on Kandle. But when he purchased a National lap steel at a vintage-guitar show in the early ’90s, it had a signed receipt from Kandle’s guitar studio, with a Chicago address. Assuming she’d passed away, years went by before, in 2007, he met one of Kandle’s former students at a steel-guitar convention in Illinois. He told Warnik that Kandle was still very much alive and living in the Chicago suburbs.
Kandle was born November 7, 1915, the only child of Charles and Alma Kandle. In her early years, she was a typical young lady of the era; she took piano lessons, but when at 13 she saw Warner Baxter play the Spanish guitar in the film The Cisco Kid, she immediately wanted to play guitar instead. Her instructor told her that the Hawaiian (also known as “steel”) guitar was becoming popular, and helped Kandle get started on the acoustic Hawaiian guitar.
Her father was supportive, and after she proved to him she was serious about playing the Hawaiian guitar, he bought top-of-the-line instruments. Her early acoustics included a koa Weissenborn and a National Style 2 (followed later by a top-of-the-line Style 4) resophonic guitar. When she spotted a turn-of-the-century doubleneck harp guitar (possibly made by Almcrantz) hanging in a second-hand shop, she asked her father to buy it. They then converted it to a Hawaiian raised-nut instrument with a standard neck and a 12-string neck capable of different tunings.
At the Chicago World’s Fair in 1933, Hawaiian music and culture was all the rage. There, Kandle met George Kealoha Gilman, who mentored her in Hawaiian lore – speaking the language, Hula dancing, and making leis and grass skirts. The following year, she formed an all-girl ensemble known as The Kohala Girls, which played Hawaiian music and had matching National Resophonic guitars.
Big-band leader Paul Whiteman named the Grand Letar.
Unlike many young musicians, Kandle was continually thinking of ways to not only improve her musicianship, but to improve the steel guitar itself. After a few years of playing with The Kohala Girls, during which time electric lap steels and double-neck lap steels became more popular, Kandle had a vision. In a series of articles for Music Studio News, she wrote about how the National Grand Letar console steel came to be; “Have you ever indulged in dreaming? If you have, you know that there are primarily two different kinds – one where the dreamer tries to escape from the reality of living, and one where the dreamer sets a mental goal for himself, and then tries by hard, honest endeavor to reach it in reality,” she wrote. “The second type of dreamer is responsible for many of the advancements of our Modern way of life.
“And so while waiting for an appointment on one of the upper floors of a tall office building in Chicago, the idea for a 26-string guitar was born. It was summer, and through the large window facing the West from where I was sitting, the sun, like a huge ball of fire, surrounded by a myriad of colors, sky blue, pink, yellow, purple, and green was dropping by the horizon, there appeared an instrument seemingly blown of glass. I kept looking at the sky, when the crisp friendly voice of the receptionist called my mind back to this world. In those few moments of daydreaming, I knew what I wanted.
“A guitar that would enable me to stand while playing it, one that would sound full, like an organ, and yet produce tones like a vibraharp – one with not less than 26 strings, for complete harmony, and one that would change colors as the different tones were produced. When I arrived home, later that evening, I told my father of the dream. Although my dad is an engineer and not a musician, he offered to help build the ‘dream instrument’ for me, if I would help.
“The problems we encountered were many, each one had to be dealt with separately – a metal had to be chosen for the casting, that would not expand or contract when in contact with heat – sizes of strings, electronics, etc. until finally after many days, weeks, and months of labor, emerged a finished instrument.
(CLOCKWISE) The restored Grand Letar. Photos: John Norris. A look inside the Grand Letar reveals the controls for its lights, and its 20-watt tube amplifier. Kandle, age 94, showing her slant-bar technique on the Small Letar. photo: Deke Dickerson.
“Now that the instrument was finished a name for it had to be selected, so, from my first name, Letritia, we took the first three letters, and from the word guitar we chose the last two letters. With this combination, the ‘dream instrument’ became the ‘Grand Letar!’”
In early 1937, Kandle’s father worked on the Grand Letar to his daughter’s specifications. A large console was made, with its top cast in aluminum and sides made of wood covered with a chrome-plated steel wrap. This was the first steel guitar that would not be played sitting in the lap, so it was a radical construction for the time. Previously, no steel guitar had ever had more than two necks. Kandle’s Grand Letar appeared to have four – three six-string and one eight-string neck – but in reality it had three six-string necks and two four-string necks!
Kandle’s father built the console, then went to see Louis Dopyera at National Guitars. Kandle had been playing National Resophonics with The Kohala Girls and knew the Dopyera family. National installed pickups and a 20-watt amplifier with two 12” JB Lansing field-coil speakers. It holds the distinction of being the first guitar amplifier to use two speakers, a full 10 years before Leo Fender made the Dual Professional, and 20-odd years before Leo began offering the Twin with JBL speakers as an option!
Kandle’s first gig was with the all-female group The Kohala Girls, which played National Resophonic instruments. Kandle, seated second from left, is holding a National Style 4.
In contrast to all of its construction and technical innovations, the Grand Letar’s coup de grace was its built-in light show, which relied heavily on Mr. Kandle’s engineering know-how. The fretboards, sides, and front were etched glass that displayed lights that shone from within. The front panel was originally a rising-sun motif, per Letritia Kandle’s vision. With the advent of World War II and the Japanese attack of Pearl Harbor, she later opted for an art-deco motif with musical notes.
Inside was a ’30s vision of the future – a network of 120 bulbs in four colors that flashed and changed colors as a motor in the base engaged electrical contacts on a flywheel. On back was a control panel with four rheostats and 12 toggle switches to control brightness and other aspects.
National built a case to transport the instrument; weighing 265 pounds by itself, once in the case the Grand Letar represented 400 pounds of freight!
At the time the Grand Letar was finished, Kandle was playing with big-band leader Paul Whiteman (who came up with the name) and she played it with Whiteman during a residency at the Drake Hotel in Chicago in 1937.
National was eager to have Kandle demonstrate the Grand Letar at the ’37 National Music Trade Convention. Held in New York City, the convention was where musical-instrument manufacturers displayed their products, and many great names demonstrated them. National signed an endorsement deal with Kandle, and arranged for her to demo the instrument at its booth. During one of the demonstrations, Kandle looked up to see her idol, Alvino Rey, watching. One of the country’s greatest steel guitar players and bandleaders, Rey left before Kandle had a chance meet him. Rey was one of the country’s greatest steel-guitar players and bandleaders – on the cusp of technological innovation – and Kandle was intrigued by the fact he left before they had a chance to speak about her instrument. Within two years, however, Rey and Gibson introduced the Console Grande steel guitar, which incorporated many of the ideas first presented in the Grand Letar at the ’37 trade show.
In addition to two Letars, Kandle used other Nationals, including this doubleneck console lap steel and matching amp from the early ’40s.
The dates of Kandle’s innovations can be verified through press on the instrument. The Music Trades ran an article about Kandle and the Grand Letar in its September ’37 issue. Down Beat, the highly regarded jazz magazine, ran a piece in October of ’37. During the made rush of stringed-instrument innovation of the late ’30s, it’s difficult to prove who did what first, but these articles prove exactly when Kandle introduced her innovations.
One of her ideas for the Grand Letar was the tuning of its necks; lap steels and doubleneck lap steels were usually tuned with one or two standard tunings, such as the low-bass A for Hawaiian playing or the C6 tuning for jazz. Kandle envisioned being able to cover all harmonic and chordal bases in a style that necessitated switching between the necks during each song. The chord inversions she devised were later utilized by pedal-steel players, with their pedals achieving the same result as switching between necks. The first neck was tuned to an A-major (high bass) tuning – A-C#-E-A-C#-E. The second neck had the standard E7 tuning – B-E-D-G#-B-E. The third was an A minor tuning which could also make C6th inversions. The fourth – an eight-string – was arranged in two small clusters, with four strings for each. One was tuned to an augmented chord (F-A-C#-F) and one was tuned to a diminished chord (F#-A-C-E).
The Grand Letar proved unwieldy, so it was mostly used for higher-profile engagements and residencies. In ’39, Kandle and her father came up with a more portable instrument, like the Grand Letar but without the amplifier and lights. The Small Letar added a seventh string to each of the standard necks, with one interesting variation on the E7 neck – a high F# string on the top of the E7 neck, which when played turned it into an E9 chord, pre-dating the Nashville E9 tuning by 20 years!
In the years that followed, National fielded several inquires about manufacturing and selling Grand Letar consoles, but the cost and weight prevented another from being made. National promoted Kandle’s involvement by picturing her in the 1940 catalog holding a Princess lap steel.
Letritia conducted the 49-piece Chicago Plectrophonic Orchestra, which featured no fewer than 17 steel guitarists!
In ’41, Kandle became the featured soloist of the 50-piece Chicago Plectrophonic Orchestra, which featured her playing classical numbers such as “Blue Danube Waltz” as well as other pop and Hawaiian numbers. When conductor Jack Lundin passed away in ’43, Kandle assumed the role.
Througout the ’40s, Kandle taught hundreds of students at her guitar studio in downtown Chicago. She was featured in the Who’s Who Of Music, judged talent competitions, made the cover of B.M.G. magazine, and authored articles for Music Studio News and other publications. She also continued her interest in advancing the steel guitar. In the late ’40s, she endorsed the Harlin Brothers Kalina Multi-Kord steel guitar, one of the early attempts at a pedal-steel guitar.
After the Grand Letar proved too bulky to transport feasibly, Kandle had National build the Small Letar. Essentially the same console-steel concept, it didn’t have the built-in amp or lights.
In 1955, Kandle married Walter Lay, a one-time string bassist for the Chicago Plectrophonic Orchestra. Both went to work for Kandle’s father, who had begun manufacturing earth-boring equipment. Kandle retired from music to concentrate on raising a family. Walter passed away in December of 2008.
Kandle’s story and early innovations could have been relegated to obscurity, since she never made any recordings (beyond a few radio transcriptions which have yet to surface), never pursued fame beyond her own musical endeavors, and never entered the public consciousness in the manner of Les Paul or Alvino Rey.
Fortunately, she archived the magazines and publicity photos that document her career. Better yet, she stored the Grand Letar in its case and out of harm’s way – under her stairs – for 55 years. Warnik restored the instrument with the help of Jeff Mikols and Sue Haslam. In September of 2008, it was transported to St. Louis, where it was played during the International Steel Guitar Convention.
Even as her story is being told and the Grand Letar is back in action, the 94-year-old Kandle’s modest attitude belies the fact that her accomplishments deserve a great deal of recognition.
The Grand Letar was an amazing technological innvovation. Kandle, however, remains humble.
“All I ever tried to do was elevate the steel guitar into a more versatile instrument that was capable of playing other styles of music, like modern and classical – not just Hawaiian music,” she said.
So while it may be 70 years late, it’s time to acknowledge the debt we owe to early electric-guitar innovators like Les Paul, Alvino Rey, Charlie Christian – and Letritia Kandle!
Special thanks to Paul Warnik, T.C. Furlong, Sue Haslam, John Norris, Jeff Mikols, and Kay Koster – and especially Letritia Kandle.
This article originally appeared in VG August 2010 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.
