juka guitars bamboo and wood

bamboo and wood sound good to me!

1000

Juergen Hierold was born in Germany in 1961 and is currently living in Vienna, Austria. He is working since 2001 for an International Organization after spending more than ten years abroad living in countries such as Sudan, Australia, Papua New Guinea and Philippines. He started playing the guitar when he was 15 but was always more interested (and better ;-) in building guitars.

	First guitar projects were started in the early 1980's and he later became an engineer for industrial woodworking. During his work in the Philippinesfrom 1994 to 2001 he got interested in bamboo as a potential wood substitute and new material for guitar making and a first semi-acoustic bamboo guitar was built as a prototype in 2000 before returning back to Europe.

He currently operates bamboo projects in various countries and he is procuring bamboo from countries such as Ethiopia (Yushania alpina), India (Bambusa tulda) and China (Moso or Phyllostachys pubescens) for his projects. In 2007 he opened his hobby guitar making workshop in his house in Vienna with all the relevant wood and bamboo processing machinery. He starts his projects either with individual dried and pre-planed bamboo strips, which are then laminated with glue and pressed into shape or based on pre-manufactured bamboo boards.

The guitar necks consist of vertically laminated bamboo strips (see pic 3); this construction is extremely strong and stable and withstands the tension of the strings (around 75 kg) and so prevents the neck from bending and twisting.

It also contributes positively to the sustain of the guitar (duration of sound after plucking the string), which is particularly important for electric guitars. He is using also carbonated bamboo strips, which have a coffee color in combination with blonde natural bamboo strips. The electric guitar bodies can be constructed in various ways.

	Due to the relatively high specific gravity or weight of the bamboo (500-700 kg/cbm) as compared to traditional wood species, a solid bamboo body guitar can be quite heavy (4-5 kg) and might be uncomfortable to play over a long period.

The alternative is to construct a hollow guitar body, which reduces the weight and also provides a deeper and softer sound compared to the treble strong solid construction.

Juergen Hierold is building his bamboo guitars for a small circle of friends and bamboo sound enthusiasts, who appreciate the uniqueness of these instruments.

Go to Top

This website contains information about guitars und basses constructed by Juergen Hierold

Specific keywords are including bamboo guitar fretboard neck body pickup steel string banjola classic