Refurbishing violins, 2023

In the summer of 2023, I got the special opportunity to live with my friend Charlie at his farm, with a group of guys my age. I was in desperate need of laughter and people to talk to, so I said yes. At the same time I received an invitation to be a vendor at The Appalachian String Band Festival that same August. Being unemployed, I thought this would be a valuable money-making scheme. Several other guys were living with us and our intenton was to create brotherly love and self-betterment. For several months, the group of us worked out, cooked, killed chickens, and digested 4Chan. Charlie and I received broken instruments and repaired them. I did the purchasing and accounting, whereas Charlie did or directed most of the woodwork. We mostly accumulated instruments from Ebay, pawn shops, and flea markets. Most of the collection was violins but I managed to find some really unique stringed instruments like a 4-string banjo and a guitar-bouzouki conversion. I even collected books, rosin, and bows for sale.

The work was slow at first , just accumulating instruments and ordering repair supplies over a month, but by the end of the two months it was full-blast work every day. It became incredibly stressful, trying to track the progress of each repair job.

Our pride and joy refurbishment was an old German violin which came with full-face splits, no tailpiece, no tail-bar, and no other accoutrements. It came as part of a lot of 4 broken violins. Charlie deserves credit for doing this repair mostly by himself. He changed that broken violin into the most beautiful operational violin by the end of our work together. When I played it after he fixed it, it was probably the most beautiful-sounding violin I had ever played.

My favorite collection piece was probably an eight-string guitar-bouzouki conversion. It had 4 sets of unison strings, just like a mandolin. I tuned AEAE like a fiddle. So, as an old-time fiddle player, it felt like butter in my hands. Imagine playing a fiddle-guitar , but an octave lower. WOW, what a great sound and how easy to play!

Charlie's farm was even dubbed "the manastery." We were all young men dedicated to bettering ourselves. We drank the spring water lifted weights, and gave each other bro-ssages. We watched anime, worked outm and cooked every night. We were all honest with each other which lent itself to a lot of "group therapy." Sometimes fights or conflicts arose, but our group always resolved them. Without going into detail, I will say that there was an episode involving a chainsaw.

But lo, my poor mental health really came to the surface. For one, I was dealing with an obsessive-compulsive disorder that was ruining my life. The group showed me support. Though unconventional, we used Pavlovian methods. I stood still still as one of the guys stood behind me with a bullwhip. As I began talking about my problems, I received a lash for every offense. I was even granted a cat-o-nine-tails for personal whipping which I grew to enjoy. I can remember Charlie speaking German and beating himself with the bull-whip. I now understand the effect of flagellation. My poor mental health made it hard for me to cooperate peacefully with people, even with these people who showed me so much support. I was constantly attention-seeking and feeling generally resentful. Eventually I was asked to leave the place because I was being low-key hateful day-in-day-out. This was important in showing me that I needed to seek professional help for bipolar disorder,

I did go to the festival and sell the instruments as planned. Unfortunately, I had to go alone. But, it was nice to be re-immersered in the old-time music scence after this intense bro-ing out at Charlie's farm. I ended up losing money on the whole deal, but it was so worth it. An open-air market where everyone would come walk around, play my instruments, talk to me and jam with me? What a dream! I am so thankful for this experience.

P.S. It is with melancholy that I write this post, looking back on the experience at the farm and at the festival. The festival was almost pure joy, and the farm was an intense experience of cooperation and teamwork. Both experiences guided me towards receiving the mental health treament from professionals that I sorely need.