Need ideas for Roland GR-33 substitute

[luthierwnc]

Hello All,

I am resurrecting a long-forgotten ergonomic guitar project for a friend who has MS. This was originally an experiment for me but a couple errors relegated it to a peg in the shop for the last couple of years. My friend is now confined to either bed or a wheelchair but his head and hands still work. Unfortunately, that isn't a good position to play conventional guitars so I did one of my "hmmmm's" (generally an expensive and time-consuming sound) and am considering options. One of those is a Roland GK-3 pickup with internal controls. Those are usually designed to go into a foot-controller. Feet ain't happening here so I'd like your help finding a similar device that uses push-buttons. The fallback position would be to mount the stompbox on a swivel tray attached to his electric bed.

When this project first came up I roughed out a paddle-head neck and gave it to a mutual friend (a fledgling builder) for him to carry it through. For some good reasons that didn't happen so it is back in my shop. The instrument itself is a sandwich of figured redwood and khaya with matching chambers in the body (and yes, those are furniture bolts). You can see the patch where a tuner bridge was flushed for a Strat bridge. Looks don't matter. It can have new routs, mismatched hardware or 16d nails and nobody will ever see them. Probably get a Tru-oil finish. Steinberger gearless tuners. The passive jack hole is already in the side but it and the MIDI out will have to go on the top so the lower thigh cutouts can be used on a padded support.

Any ideas on the Roland or completely different MIDI suggestions are appreciated, thanks, Skip

[Mark Hammer]

First, nice work, and commendable motives. I was recently looking at the Gibson map-shaped guitar, so my first inclination was to think "Hmm, I wonder what state that's supposed to resemble?".

A local musician has a guitar he commissioned for himself from a local builder that has a similarly compact sort of build, and is meant to be played in a seated position. It uses a fanned fretboard to accommodate bass strings. I tried it out once, and it is very comfortable and just crazy light. Sankey Guitars - rippling brook You can see it in action here: "Birdland" Performed by Tim Bedner - YouTube

I have a Casio MG-510 guitar. The MG-510 is basically a Strat clone that has what I gather is the equivalent of a GK-2 pickup, and provides direct MIDI out. One of the more interesting features is that patchs can be selected from the fingerboard. Flick the "program select" toggle, pick a given note on a given string, and there's your program change.

Perhaps something like that might be suitable for your friend? The guitar itself is a little heavy-ish, and the neck is long-scale, but I wonder if one couldn't remove the electronics from one and stick it in a smaller unit. Or at least have some sort of onboard control that was analogous to the MG-510.

On a side note, I have a Line 6 M5 multi-FX unit. Many units like this have an expression pedal input. Expression pedal standards vary, but on the Line 6 units, the expression pedal is simply a 10k variable resistance to ground. When I learned this, I thought "Well, it doesn't HAVE to be a foot pedal", and wired up a suitable photocell, which I then taped onto the top of my guitar, between bridge and volume pot, and wiggled my pinky over it to play the Whammy patch that Line 6 included with the unit. Worked like a charm.

If you want to get even fancier, I recommend the Source Audio Hot Hand 3, which will output up to 3 different control voltages that correspond to hand movements in 3 dimensions, using a wireless ring-like controller. I corresponded with their tech folks, and learned that one of the control outputs is the equivalent of a Line 6 expression pedal (variable 10k resistance), and the other two are roughly 3V control voltages that Source Audio uses as their own proprietary standard for their pedals.

In any event, there are a variety of quite usable forms of MIDI and other control to choose from, that don't require use of feet, reaching any farther than the guitar, or great strength.

[luthierwnc]

Thanks for the compliment.

It is more the preamp/processor I'm thinking about than the pickup. Baggs and Fishman have piezo bridges that will also work. It is what they plug into that has me wondering right now. The few other MIDI guitars I've built were for people who knew exactly what they wanted and generally already had the downstream boxes. One of those was an RMC built into a conventional classical bridge on a laminated ash busking guitar.

This is a case where the processor should be near eye level for someone sitting down and within easy reach of his right hand.

cheers, sh