New to ukulele from Tennessee

[Armsdad]

So it's a Koa? Is that a name brand or maker. Im.new to all this uke stuff.

 

[Armsdad]

Oh.I see now. OSCAR SHMIDT. cool.and thanks very much. I spent a week searching and.knew there had to be another one somewhere like it. I guess this was the ol.dead guys uke. The fiddle case was mailed once. Has 5 cent stamps..and the guys name was J.B Fleming from.Alamo TN. Here are the cases. No label on fiddle. , both open from.the back. Fiddle needs lots of love..and a new fingerboard and nut. I bought a bridge and tuning pegs already.

 

[modwitch]

So it's a Koa? Is that a name brand or maker. Im.new to all this uke stuff.

Koa is the wood it’s made from. That’s the good stuff . I’m completely jealous.

 

[Armsdad]

I really appreciate you finding that. So is it a good one? It does seem to play good what little I can play on it. Been watching video I'm excited to learn more. Never knew ukuleles could make such sound and beautiful music. I'm a country boy bluegrass person. Only uses I ever saw or heard before a few months ago were on T.V and just strummed. I gotta learn some that fancy pickin now.

 

[modwitch]

Very amateur fiddle player here, but I have a 200yr old violin (a very humble one likely made by an amateur) and got a little obsessed with this stuff. Here’s what I see in your photos, with the caveat that I could be very wrong (and you might be an awesome fiddler who already knows all this!)

Best guess is it’s a German trade violin. Those were made in that era in the Markneukirchen area of Germany for export to America. Lots of them got sold for $2-5 in the Sears catalogue. Which matches up with how Oscar Schmidt was doing business in the 1920s. Likely the original owner was rural, and these were humble but serviceable instruments, made of far better tonewood than their equivalents today.

The possibly bad news is your violin looks like it may have a soundpost crack (what looks like a big crack running vertically down from the edge of the right side f-hole in the photos). Those are very bad. Soundposts are a small, moveable dowel of wood that runs from the back to the top of the violin, close to the treble foot of the bridge. It handles loads of pressure, and it’s really hard to effectively repair a crack that runs through where the soundpost lives. It doesn’t work to just cleat it like a regular crack (and even that involves taking the top off, ie expensive repair). It involves carving a very big new patch - a new chunk of violin top, basically, and inlaying it in the old top and hoping it plays nicely in terms of sound. Highly expert, very time intensive work. If I’m right about that being a crack, and about it being a German trade violin, a luthier would likely tell you it’s unfixable/not worth fixing. .

But honestly if you bought two old instruments like this and one of them is super cool and playable, I think you did great!

I’m sad about the violin, though. I love German trade fiddles. Some of them sound wonderful.

 

[modwitch]

I really appreciate you finding that. So is it a good one? It does seem to play good what little I can play on it. Been watching video I'm excited to learn more. Never knew ukuleles could make such sound and beautiful music. I'm a country boy bluegrass person. Only uses I ever saw or heard before a few months ago were on T.V and just strummed. I gotta learn some that fancy pickin now.

I’m really new to ukulele too! So I’ll leave it to the experts to tell you how good it is, but it’s made from nice wood and sounds good, and that’s seems like a great vintage uke to me!

Do you play other instruments? Definitely possible to do country and bluegrass on a uke .

 

[Armsdad]

Ya , may as well spill the beans so to speak. I paid $60 for both. I do play fiddle some but no expert by any means. I have fixed a few back up. There is a crack there but I've always wanted a solid 1 piece back fiddle. I got it to fix or try to and play. The uke I bought because the wood looked nice to me and only needed strung up. Figured I'd let my 6 yr old play it and me the new one I have. But now I think it will be the other way around. Don't want her dragging around a 1920s koa wood uke. Im guessing it's probably worth more than the new one. I may go crazy and put the sound post in another position the Crack gives me alota grief. Will try and fix it 1st tho since I only have about 50$ in it so far. I can't hurt it for sure. I'm a gunsmith for a hobby. I like to try n fix the un fixable. I have another old junk fiddle I could maybe cut a patch from. It's just a hobby for me. Gotta learn somehow.

 

[stevejfc]

Welcome Armsdad!

 

[modwitch]

Sounds like you have the skills to make a valiant attempt - I hope it works! You might be able to swap out for a different top. The Markneukirchen fiddles were pretty standardized and junk ones aren’t hard to come by. And the one piece backs are really pretty.

Laughing at you buying an unexpectedly fancy uke for your 6yo, though!

 

[Oldscruggsfan]

$60 for 2 antique instruments was a fine deal, @Armsdad Not bluegrass but here are my kit- assembled soprano uke versions of Its Only A Paper Moon, Mister Bojangles & There’ll Be Some Changes Made.
View attachment IOAPM in G - standard GCEA.m4a

View attachment TBSCM - 1921.m4a

 

[Oldscruggsfan]

Randy Travis’s Three Wooden Crosses
View attachment 3WC.m4a
This may go without sayin’ but all are played with standard GCEA reentrant (high G) tuning. I was using Fremont Blackline strings for Mister Bojangles and Martin M605 Graphites for the other 3.