Cutaway Koa Super Tenor Ukulele
Len from Hawaii, talked me into making a cutaway ukulele for him. Here’s the result, the Cutaway Koa Super Tenor Ukulele.
Compression curl Koa wood.
Len picked this particular set of Koa wood for his instrument–compression curl with Koa blonds and reddish browns.
Red heart abalone back strip.
In addition the the red heart abalone back strip I also made the lower bout graft in the same material.
Red heart abalone accent for the lower bout.
I decided on a Florentine-style cutaway for this instrument–with Len’s approval of course. The beauty of this design, at least for me, is that I didn’t have to build any new molds or alter my bending technique to accommodate this construction. Yes!
Florentine cutaway super tenor ukulele.
Len also requested lots of bling. To bring out the reds and greens of the red heart abalone I used fuchsia and black fiber accents.
Lots of red heart abalone bling.
In addition, a curly koa neck was added as well as my usual burl wood accents. The tuners are Waverly with curly Koa knobs. Len, you’re killing me!
Curly koa neck.
I thought it played well, and I really liked the feel of the cutaway. I thought the instrument favored the treble side of the sound spectrum a bit which might be attributed to the cutaway design–more of an traditional ukulele sound even with the Thomastik wound G and C. Here’s a quick, phone SOUND SAMPLE–I’ll let you decide.
All-in-all this turned out to be both a fun and a learning project for me–thanks Len for pushing me a bit. Now, I’m going to have to make another Cutaway Koa Super Tenor for Hale Ukulele .
