David started building it in october 2017 @ CMB (Centre for Musical Instrument Building – Puurs, Belgium), starting with the mould which he made together with the mould for his lute project. He then continued working on it at home in the basement until his departure to the Vercors, France, in July 2018. From August that year, he continued to work on it passionately there and by September that year the shell was finished.

The neck had been hollowed out and attached to the shell by November. That hollowing out gave him a good tendinitis, he was unable to play guitar for six months…. and by December the fingerboard was on. He deliberately kept that one completely flat.

In February 2019, he started working on the tabli, which finally got ready in April (finished with the fish holes instead of F-holes, it’s based on Art-Nouveau carp designs, but people sometimes see sharks or whales in there 🙂 )

By September he finished the parda rails, he put in the tuning pegs in January 2020 with the help of a friendly violin maker who borrowed his reamers. By March 2020 the sitar was completed with the pardas on, but no taravs yet. In June, the tarav rail was added, deliberately opting for a system with cithar tuning pins: The neck is from Limba, a type of wood that is quite stringy, and it seemed dangerous to drill about fifteen holes in a single line along the entire length there and then to start pushing tuning pins into it…?

David based this instrument on the Dieter Zarnitz designs during a visit there but he modified Dieter’s plan a little. Dieter Zarnitz’s sitars are symmetrical, while David has given the neck on a slight angle upwards and also a slight twist opposite the tabli.

The tabli is 400mm wide. The neck is 94mm wide. The scale is 920mm (3cm longer than a standard sitar).
This baritone sitar is tuned lower then a regular sitar. It is tuned in B#, which turns out to be the Helmholz frequency of the shell. The extra bass string sounds very good.

Info about the wood of this instrument:
Merisier (from Vosges) is used for the shell, given to him by his father.

The reels are made out of Linde.
The neck and fingerboard are made from Limba.
The tarav rails are made out of Indian Rosewood.
The tabli is Epicea from near Grenoble, given to him by a violin maker (it was a piece meant to make a cello).
The langoot is made from moose antlers reinforced with steel nails

The ghodi is made out of Rosewood
A surbahar string set is mounted.

Have a look

It’s a beauty !!!

Wax is used as a filler. Prepare it by melting it slowly. Be careful not to overheat. Also, …damps can be dangerous! Add some nice colour pigments to the melted wax and stir. Use a scraper to apply the wax on the engravings. Let it cool down and scrape the excess off.

A scraper can be made out of an old and worn blade of a hacksaw. Make the edges surface nicely straight and perfectly even. Don’t be afraid to polish it up. Then learn to scrape by holding it almost perpendicular to the surface.

More info on Elforyn™ here: www.elforyn.info

It’s a clever and easy idea… to provide your universal bench vice with a stable and ergonomic base. It makes this handy basic tool so much more versatile. It’s a very useful tool for lots of sitar (and other -) work. A no-miss for jiwari work (!!), parda making and mizrab making. Over-all convenient for general wood work – cutting / sawing / drilling / glue-clamp. Although in India hands as well as feet are trained to perform together in sitar making, this always available, never tired and always strong helping hand will become surely your daily friend.

This photo: Hari Chand on my workbench, Bierbeek 2000. Photo by Shivoham.

I’ve added a simple and illustrated “how to build” guideline to Maintenance / Tools – page. Or click here.

The music is from Ustad Vilayat Khan: Raag Hameer.

This guitar has a Honduras mahogany body and neck with Indian rosewood fretboard and head top plate.
Because the original instruments sound wasn’t very inspiring I decided to replace the pickups with some modern and better performing types made by Di Marzio. Their DP145 Will Power™ neck model is very deep-sounding with great low-end definition. Its dimensions are the same as the original replacement Model One™, but it’s a little louder and fatter-sounding, and pole piece spacing is slightly wider for better string alignment with long-scale basses.

pictures made by Luc De Gezelle 2009

The guitar has a beautiful head of walnutroot-veneer.

As it was my first own built acoustic instrument, it took me 2 years to finish it. Body made out of rosewood, cedar top plate, Honduras mahogany neck and fretboard in ebony. Rosette with abalone…