Wonderful Amy got me a cigar box ukulele kit for Christmas… more than a year ago :)
I finally finished the build a few weeks ago (ridiculous, right?), and have been having a gas with it. Full writeup and pics over on Bucketlist, but here’s the slideshow version, as well as a little video I put together to show how the sound of a cigar box compares to the warm tones of a nice professionally built koa wood uke.
As I was told by a uke head in Hawaii at the start of last summer, “Sound is round, round is sound. What do you expect from a square box?”
The Flickr set includes captions. Here’s the video comparing sound of the cigar box to a “real” uke:
The cigar box sounds a little bit like a banjolele, which I quite like. Good to add some rhythm to old swing tunes, or to play some George Formby. That said, nothing beats a good Koa uke.
Stijn, word! Unfortunately I didn’t use a separate mic for this little demo, and the difference in the sound of the two is not nearly as dramatic as it is IRL. Next time…
Uber cool, thanks for sharing !
Aloha,
Brent
Thanks Brent, glad you dug it.
The Cigar Box looks awesome I would love to hang that up in my living room, but I have to say the sound from the ukulele wins!