Improvisations on Pat's Handmade Guitar

My good friend, mandolinist bandmate, and SC collaborator Pat Howell started building a guitar from a mail-order kit some thirty years ago, got pretty far along on it, then had a local luthier do the finishing work.  It is the guitar pictured and is a masterpiece of craftsmanship and sound.   Being thoroughly smitten by all things mandolin, the guitar hasn't been played much, and he paid me the highest complement by asking me to record the guitar so he can hear what it sounds like as a listener.  I readily agreed mostly because it was a chance to play the guitar again:)  As I was improvising into the Zoom, this little nugget showed up and thought you all might like to hear it too:) I did some editing for musical flow and added some reverb, but nothing else was done to alter the tone of the guitar.  It is a special song for my friend.

For My Friend--Part 1

This is part 2 of some improvisational recordings I made with Pat Howell's beautiful handcrafted-from-a -kit dreadnought acoustic guitar.  Part 1 details the guitar's journey a little more and here I wanted Pat to hear his guitar in drop D tuning, and I thought you'd like to hear it too:)

For My Friend--Part 2

What a joy it was to play Pat's hand-built guitar in this series of improvisational musings.  This one is also in Drop D tuning drawing  inspiration from Fahey to Beethoven, but no inspiration more prominent than Pat himself in our friendship and collaborations.  As in the previous parts, only reverb was added to enhance the ambience of the guitar sound, no tonal filters were used.

For My Friend--Part 3 Miscellaneous Musings

I came across this little improv I did a while back on Pat Howell's beautifully crafted home-built guitar, and had been keeping it in my back pocket for St. Patty's Day.  In this track I riff on some tunes I've played over the last several years but take on a new richness played on his guitar in drop D tuning.  If you're keeping score, the first is "Emerald Isle", the second is "A Splash of Joy" and last is "Celtic D'lite".  Enjoy with your favorite Irish brew:)

Celtic Musings On Pat's Guitar

I am a finger-style guitarist living on the Texas high plains.  At the core of my music is melody that is inspired and informed by my Christian faith, family, friends, and countless influences through the years from the great composers, to jazz, folk, rock, Latin, Celtic, and the many fine musicians I have come to love on the Cloud, some I have been privileged to collaborate with.  Thanks for stopping by to have a listen. Comments are always welcome. Feel free to click on the picture of any track to learn more about it.

Improvisations on Pat's Handmade Guitar

David Dunham