Voyageur: Canada's Guitar

March 25, 2008 7:49 AM

Imagine a guitar constructed from a country’s history. Recently named Voyageur, the Six String Nation guitar is just that: Canada’s Guitar.

The brainchild of broadcaster Jowi Taylor, constructed by master luthier George Rizsanyi, the guitar is made up of more than 60 culturally-significant pieces of wood, bone (and other animal parts), stone and metal, including:
- Kiidk’yaas – The Golden Spruce
- The world’s longest covered bridge
- The Maid of the Mist (warning: sound)
- The monument to Almighty Voice
- Seats from Massey Hall and the Forum
- Sticks from Gretzky and Henderson and gold from one of Richard’s 1955-56 Stanley Cup ring
- Trudeau’s canoe paddle
- A shibba from Fairmount Bagel Bakery in Montreal

The lining of the guitar’s yellow case includes material from one of Don Cherry’s suits and Pierre Berton’s bow tie. Explore all the different components here.

First played by Stephen Fearing on Parliament Hill on Canada Day 2006, the guitar now travels the country with the aim of connecting people from all regions through music, stories, icons and images.

posted by valleys (17 comments total)

That is weird. But very very cool.

And somebody finally found a use for Don Cherry's suits!
posted by ardgedee at 7:55 AM on March 25, 2008

Does it threaten to fall apart every couple of years?
posted by blue_beetle at 8:00 AM on March 25, 2008 [3 favorites]

Here's a similar built guitar, built by University of Guelph Professor Dr. Doug Larson, that was inspired by the Six String Nation guitar. "He's used wood from trees he's studied, like the ancient cedars of the Niagara Escarpment, ivory from extinct mammoths, fossilized fish, turtle shell, and hundreds of other components"

Check out the CBC radio show Quirks and Quarks (scroll down to "Six String Science")
posted by BozoBurgerBonanza at 8:05 AM on March 25, 2008

The guitar itself is kind of over the top, from a design standpoint...so much going on.
But this is just so very cool. I'm in awe.
posted by dan g. at 8:28 AM on March 25, 2008

I saw that canada day performance! the guitar was definitely the best part of the show (it was raining)
posted by Planet F at 8:33 AM on March 25, 2008

This is all very nice, really, but I feel my Canadian resistance to patriotic symbolizing kicking in (Don Cherry's suit lining?!) and thinking "What's next, a sliver from Peter Gzowski's butt plug?"

I know this sort of feeling is shared by at least some of the other hosers. Here's my evidence: when Americans and other foreign tourists visit the Parliament in Ottawa they send Mountie postcards home to their family and friends as nice souvenirs. We do the same thing, but as a joke.
posted by Turtles all the way down at 8:34 AM on March 25, 2008

Oh, and valleys, don't you dare every again post a video of the Henderson goal when I've got work to do and other things to concentrate on. Now I'm all weepy.
posted by Turtles all the way down at 8:37 AM on March 25, 2008

I feel my Canadian resistance to patriotic symbolizing kicking in (Don Cherry's suit lining?!)

I take the incorporation of Cherry and Berton's duds as being fun, irreverent, and archly self-aware in much the same way your jokey souvenir postcards are; I've heard several interviews with the folks behind the project, and the impression I've gotten is that they aren't interested in rabid patriotism or nationalist aggrandizement so much as just sharing cool things about our country.

Plus, they let the local CBC announcer play the beginning of Stairway To Heaven on it, which was pretty keen.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 9:09 AM on March 25, 2008

I've seen it a couple of times -- Justin Rutledge plays it in concert occasionally.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:13 AM on March 25, 2008

Good luck, Canada, in the construction of your National Igloo!
posted by Krrrlson at 9:37 AM on March 25, 2008 [1 favorite]

I know one of the guys who played it on Canada Day in 2006 (from the group, Finest Kind). He says it's no hell as a musical instrument. I'm happy to think of it as primarily symbolic, rather than musical.

Link goes to an mp3.
posted by LN at 9:49 AM on March 25, 2008

Okay, this makes more sense to me now that I've figured out that the Don Cherry they're talking about is not the late jazz trumpet-player. Cool guitar!
posted by trip and a half at 10:12 AM on March 25, 2008

In the US, Paul Simon did this by merely writing a line:

The Mississippi Delta was shining like a National guitar.

Hats off, beaver, tocque, or otherwise, for not using that phrase in the main post.
posted by mwhybark at 10:47 AM on March 25, 2008

"Now I'm all weepy."

Here's an antidote: Peter Forsberg vs. Corey Hirsch.

(fwiw, the swedish post office made a stamp from this, but had to withdraw it after Hirsch threatened to sue).
posted by effbot at 10:54 AM on March 25, 2008

I just saw Stephen Fearing in concert the other night, and he puts on a great show. The link there goes to his music page, and you can listen to snippets of his tunes, including Longest Road, which was the first song played officially in public on the Six-String Nation guitar.
posted by roombythelake at 11:06 AM on March 25, 2008

there are many great GREAT canadian guitars.

seagull,
godin,
lapatrie,

and the greatest of all:

the larivee parlour guitar (see the 'u' in the name? it stand for quality!)

god bless you, jean larivee (i pronounce that like an american, sorry)
posted by stubby phillips at 3:28 PM on March 25, 2008

Perhaps this is one of those chicken and the egg things, but from the read it seemed like they picked a rather obvious choice:

[A]t the launch of the Festival du Voyageur, the official nickname of the guitar was announced. The announcement was the culmination of an 18-month-long contest to nickname the guitar. The winning entry was chosen from among more than a thousand entries from the public. ... [The winner was] on hand at the press conference to help announce the official nickname: VOYAGEUR.

Maybe I mis-read it, but I don't know what kind of letdown it would be go to a festival where after eighteen months they picked the name of the festival for the guitar.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 4:16 PM on March 25, 2008