Tuesday, January 1, 2013

I came across this video...

...once of Mark Knopfler singing "Romeo and Juliet," and I thought, that's an unusual-looking guitar. 

And then this morning I read the obit of a guy named Mike Auldridge. The Times described him as: 

...a guitarist who became one of the most distinctive dobro players in the history of country and bluegrass music...

And I thought, what the heck is a "dobro?"

A resophonic (or resonating) acoustic guitar, the dobro produces sound by means of one or more spun metal cones instead of a wooden sound board. (The instrument’s name is a contraction of Dopera and brothers. Dopera was the surname of the Slovak-American brothers who patented an early version of the instrument in 1928.)

Huh. You learn something new every day. (So that's what Knopfler was playing.)

Here's Auldridge on the dobro:

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