Making playground instruments for St Werburghs Community Centre in Bristol, using locally grown timber and some reclaimed materials

Recently, one idea that has interested me is making sculptures that can be played as instruments. This linked nicely into a recent commission. A community centre in Bristol wanted instruments to go in their new garden next to the M32 motorway.

The spaces where the instruments were to be installed weren't big, being between already existing planters. This limited the amount of keys, chime bars etc. that could be used in each one . After chatting with the director of the centre I designed and made them some playable structures that we felt also looked good.

The reddish-coloured woods, used for the xylophone keys amongst other things, are sepele and utile. These are both timbers from trees that grow in West Africa. I tend to only use reclaimed tropical woods in my work and these were no exception, having been bearers for timber deliveries to a local company which are usually destined for burning. The posts and other timbers are European Larch; a durable locally-grown timber. 

One particularly enjoyable part of making these was turning the 'rattle poles' on my Myford lathe, for the last instrument played in the video.

They are quite big pieces and it was a fun challenge to turn them evenly and for both of them to be as similar as possible.

I had help from volunteers during the installation, which made the job a lot easier! Everyone was very happy with the new instruments, including me (as you can probably tell by the big smile at the end of the video).

A drum stool with a difference! Making carved wooden drums as seats

The story of this project begins last summer...

I had been invited to make some carvings for Gwalia farm near Machynlleth in North Wales, in return for a stay there at their stunning 'Cabin by the Lake'. This beautiful spot has a private lake, canoe and wood-fired hot tub.

Luckily, an oak tree on the farm had just dropped a large branch and so there was plenty of timber to carve!

The cabin was missing some nice seating around the fire, so by the end of the week I'd carved an owl stool...

As well as a stool with a carving of a Natterer's bat (as a few of them were flying around the cabin at dusk).The second stool also had slits cut into it, to make bars which made a note when struck. They are a bit similar to a West African 'krin' drum:

I really liked the drum idea and showed a few people when back in Bristol. Jono at Touchwood Play realised that the drum stools would work very well in a new project that they were working on. After making a couple more examples to refine the idea, I was commissioned to make six of the stools.

First there was a trip out to Backwell, near Bristol, to look at the oak timber available. It had to be of a certain diameter to make a good stool. Once the logs were back at my workshop, the hard work began!

Firstly, the logs were cut to size, the bark removed using a mallet and chisel and then the stools were smoothed to remove tool marks. I used a chainsaw to cut the bars into the logs.

The bars then needed to be sanded and cleaned up, which took a lot of time. Once that had been done, I carved two rows of ridges onto each stool, to make an effect a little bit similar to an instrument called a 'guiro'.

The drums still needed sticks to play them with. These were turned from locally-grown hornbeam timber. Hornbeam is a very tough wood, traditionally used to make butcher's chopping blocks and the teeth for large cogs, such as in mill workings. It was perfect for this job.

The sticks were chained onto the drums using good-quality stainless steel chain (as stainless steel doesn't react with and discolour oak, unlike normal iron or steel). There was also a hole drilled into each drum to hold the sticks when not in use. The chain is attached halfway along the stick to avoid it making a dangerous looping foot snare when stored in its holder.

The drums just needed a few coats of finishing oil and they were done. Using a tuning app on a phone, we also managed to find out what notes the different bars made. There was a surprising range! Quite a few were A or B, but one played three C notes with an octave between each. Others played Gs and Fs. You can hear them on this Youtube video:

I'd like to refine the tuning methods on future drums, although the tuning on these drums will probably change a bit over time anyway, as the wood dries.  

I did notice that small cracks in the oak, formed during seasoning, didn't seem to affect the sound much at all.

The drums will eventually be mounted in a circle onto a wooden platform in a play tower. They will be fixed down using large screws, so that they can't fall over or be thrown and injure anyone. To allow them to resonate and make a good sound, there will be rubber feet under each one. I've placed wooden sticks under them in these photos to allow a good resonance when playing them in the workshop.

Wood carving at the 'Really Classical Relay', accompanied by historical instruments such as the viol da gamba and Baroque oboe.

Last weekend, the Bristol Music Club played host to the 'Really Classical Relay' and I was invited to demonstrate wood carving there.

The Bristol Music Club has been running for over a hundred years and specialises in hosting recitals of chamber music at its home in Clifton. 

The Really Classical Relay was a three-day event at which an international group of very talented musicians played classical pieces in a relaxed environment. Children were welcome during the day and visitors could bring food and drink from the cafe into the room while they listened. It was a really nice atmosphere to be in, as you may imagine.

I was set up in the reception next door and spent the afternoon carving a relief portrait of Beethoven into ash timber (F. excelsior). In the evening, the carving was auctioned and the profits went towards the running of the event.

Of course there were times when a quiet piece of music required me to down tools for a bit, rather than crashing over it with some unexpected percussion using mallet and gouge!

It was fun to do a relief portrait. I really enjoy the challenge of carving portraits; they aren't easy and anyone can spot if the likeness of a famous person is wrong. Happily, even without the chance to do any prior research and little reference material to work from, everyone spotted that this was Beethoven...

It was also great to see the beautiful reproductions of historical instruments such as the viol da gamba being played for some pieces.  Another instrument that caught my eye was a Baroque oboe made from boxwood (B. sempervirens), similar to this one:

Image from https://sites.google.com/site/ohmusicstudent/band-instruments/oboe/oboe-history

Thanks to Jon and the team for making me so welcome.

Bowl turning on a pole lathe, jousting, birds of prey and an unlucky king at Carisbrooke Castle.

Carisbrooke Castle is a very interesting place. It lies just outside Newport, the Isle of Wight's biggest town. There are signs of settlement there going back to pre-Roman times, but most of the fortifications date to later than the Norman keep that sits on the motte (or mound) overlooking the site.

The castle has been remodelled several times, which can be seen even at the entrance gatehouse.

The lower part was built in 1335 and has cross-shaped firing points, for bows and crossbows. The gatehouse was extended above the horizontal lines around it in 1378, when the French threatened to attack it during the Hundred Years War. The extended part has circular holes with slits and would be used by defenders firing handguns.

There was extensive remodelling of the castle during the sixteenth century under the guidance of Sir George Carey, due to the threat from the Spanish Armada. However, some of the buildings from this time are now in ruins.

The chapel of St Nicholas in Castro was renovated in 1904, after falling into disrepair through lack of use because the church in the village was more accessible to most people. It is now a memorial to Charles I as well as being the war memorial chapel for the Isle of Wight. There are some nice Edwardian woodcarvings on the pews, showing the symbols for the writers of the gospels.

The castle houses a very interesting museum with many of the exhibits concerned with King Charles I, who was imprisoned at Carisbrooke for fourteen months before being taken to his execution. His daughters were also imprisoned there and one, Princess Elizabeth, died there.

Quite a few of the exhibits are of interest to a carver. One is an ivory gaming piece, dating to Norman times, from a game called 'tables', which was similar to backgammon.

This chamber organ was built in 1602 and is still in working order. It shows the arms of the Earl of Montrose and has Flemish inscriptions taken from the bible carved onto it. I don't think that the electrical flex is connected to the instrument!

There are also other carved pieces on show:

As well as this fragment of a medieval saw blade:

While we were visiting Carisbrooke, there was a 'medieval' joust and displays of medieval skills such as falconry and bowmaking. The joust took place on the bowling green, where Charles I played bowls whilst he was imprisoned. It was previously the drill ground for soldiers stationed at the castle and may well have seen jousting in medieval times.

One of the exhibitors was 'James the Bowl', who was making wooden bowls turned on a pole lathe. I had an interesting chat with him about what he was doing.

James told me that a lot of the designs for the equipment that he was using came from an image of a turner making equipment for the Mary Rose, although the image doesn't show a toolrest, which would have been vital. Many early images don't, perhaps because it would obscure the view and confuse the viewer.

Apparently, many kinds of timber were used to make the turned bowls found on the Mary Rose. Bowls have even been found made from oak, which tends to split and can taint food so is not normally used for this purpose. One timber that was not found is willow.

The shapes of the gouges used to cut the bowls have been worked out from the cut marks on found ones. Robin Wood, a well-known pole lathe bowl turner, has done a lot of work on this subject.

The mandrel, which holds the wooden blank to be turned into the bowl, is also not shown on old pictures. James' one has three flattened points, which he explained helps to keep the blank on. He said that other methods were known to have been adopted, Viking finds have had many points stuck into the blank and sometimes a simple round mortice and tenon was used, with a sliver of green wood in the mortice to wedge it in. The mandrel needs to be pretty tough and could be carried between places, so having iron bands on each end of it to prevent splitting would make sense.

It was very interesting to see what bowl turning in medieval and Tudor times was like and how people have filled in the gaps in historical knowledge by practical experience. The jousting was a lot of fun to watch too!

If you would like to see James' blog, it is at:

http://jamesthebowl.blogspot.co.uk

Robin Wood is a very well-known and respected pole lathe bowl turner and his website is at:

http://www.robin-wood.co.uk

This is an interesting overview of historical pole lathe turning:

http://www.turningtools.co.uk/history2/history-turning2.html

Carisbrooke Castle museum has a website here:

http://www.carisbrookecastlemuseum.org.uk