Guest Luthier - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

[J Moose]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Comfort!
We went with the original design.

There are 'cylindrical' tops that date back to lutes in the 1800s and more recently Rick Turners guitars - they are just comfortable.

That guitar was mine first and Elliot wanted it!
He loaned my his "Reeling in the Years" strat for a few weeks so I could not say no. :approve:

That's really funny... because I remember "comfort" being a large part of the conversation we had about that instrument! At that point I had been playing the same Hamer for a few years and he had spent many years with that Strat... and we both seemed to agree that our respective instruments felt like home & anything else felt weird, but that MC1 was just right.

This was probably 1997 or therebouts...

At the time, I recall that there were some more 'traditional' instruments with alder or ash bodies, still with the curved top but there was like a H/S/S setup or something like that in the line. USA made.

Was that more challenging to build then a regular old Strat? Or about the same?

And where are the i2000's made? USA or overseas?

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Pat
Just wanted to say thanks for inspiring me.
I'm in the process of building my own 13-pin/piezo guitar and your site helped in the decision making process.

One question; what is the likelihood of you guys doing an all-composite type guitar?

Thanks
MM

We began with the MC1 which was based on a composite construction and while we have many MC1 fanatics, as we we grew, a growing majority guitarists said they preferred the tone of a wood guitar - so, while an all composite guitar is something we could do, it is not on the front burner at the moment-

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Given the nature of your research in computer/guitar interfaces, I think I have the most appropriate question. Please stare at the Seymour Duncan logo while answering, it will record your responses.

You're in a desert, walking along in the sand, when all of a sudden you look down and see a tortoise, Patrick. It's crawling toward you. You reach down and you flip the tortoise over on its back.

The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can't. Not without your help. But you're not helping. You're not helping! Why is that, Patrick?


( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qc_204tXHZY )

Jet-Jaguar - A great wise man once said:
"If you want a better answer, then ask a better question"

Please clarify and I will do my best to respond.
Thank you.

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

a friend of mine has a semi hollow/hollow single cutaway brian moore and ive never seen another one like it. his name is Robert Gerhards but he goes by Cue most of the time. do you know what model im refering to? is it a total custom guitar? it looks almost like a thinline jazz box

Hi Jeremy,

Yes, we have built a very limited amount of hollow body guitars in the custom shop, with several body shapes. We have also used E - Holes instead of F - holes on several of these models like this EH model
http://iguitar.com/limited/limitededitionmodels.asp?guitar=C55EH

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Thank you very much for the informative reply!

Eric,
My contact info is below if you would like us to build something with a nice set of Duncans!

 

[darnright]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Hi Pat. Welcome to the forum. I guess the question on my mind is "In your opinion, what is the most distinctive thing about iGuitars or Brian Moore that says..this is the best I can do. What says this is different than what's been done and I am most proud of this?" I have never owned either, I have played several Brian Moore customs and I was very impressed.

Again, I thank you for sharing of yourself with us.

If my question has already been asked, sorry, I just walked in the door from work.

Thanks again,

dave

 

[speed2dirt]

Re: Guest Luthier - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Touching on the whole USB thing, could one plug their guitar into their iPod via the standard cable that came with the iPod and have a mobile amp when using the headphones? I know you mentioned the guitar being USB bus powered and the iPod may not give off enough power to run the electronics. Just curious as that could be a practical use for the mobile musician.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Guest Luthier - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

I'll tell ya, my Custom C55 has served me well over the years. It is really comfortable as well as versatile- and if you mix in that piezo right, there is a whole world of tones available.

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

The USB/Midi thing is what I am interested in. Will it carry a piezo signal too?

Yes, our current iGuitar.USB sends both the magnetic and piezo signal as streaming digital audio over USB.

Check out this video demo on the John Lennon Bus
http://media.jlsc.com/schedule/2005/viewer.php?file=newiguitar.mp4

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Which guitarists tone and feel really make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up?

I believe I misread your post, sorry..

As far as hair standing on the back of my neck, Jeff Becks tone does that!

- Duane Allman slide tone on the Filmore East is also incredible
- Eric Johnsons tone on Cliffs os Dover
- Larry Carlton tone on the Room 335 album

Just to name a few...

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

mine does - aftermarket AIIP and JB ... sperzels too ... and a p-type 5-way megaswitch

brian moore guitars / iguitars rock!

thanks for everything

t4d

Thats great - its hard to beat the tone from Seymour Duncan pickups!

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

patrick,
welcome to the forum & thanks for your time

you guys make some great-looking singlecut and doublecut models, but have you ever tried/considered making a "pointy" shaped model (flying V, explorer, etc.)?

would different shapes such as those present any difficulties for fitting in the additional electronics?

speaking of which, how much more room does that hardware take as opposed to a "regular" guitar?

We have considered other shapes and hope to offer other choices down the road a bit...
Our shop does technology upgrades on all types of guitars and standard guitar cavities seem to fit everything...

 

[Jet-Jaguar]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Jet-Jaguar - A great wise man once said:
"If you want a better answer, then ask a better question"

Please clarify and I will do my best to respond.
Thank you.

There was no real question in that post, I was just riffing on the digital nature of your products. Or maybe partly digital nature, since you use wood. Anyway, the questions were from a movie called Blade Runner. In particular, they are used in a scene where a policeman questions a person to determine if that person is, in fact, a human or simply a robot that appears to be human.

When I was in my late teens/early twenties, I read cyber-punk science fiction literature by William Gibson, in which people would connect their brains directly to machines to make music. I bought a computer and a synth to play around with, partly because of that. Years later, those mind interfaces seem as far-fetched as flying cars.

Anyway, a better question might be, in a forward thinking niche like the one you've carved out, what non-music-industry things have inspired your work?

 

[Evan Skopp]

Re: Guest Luthier - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Thanks for participating in our Guest Luthier Series, Pat. And thanks for staying late to get all the questions answered.

Congrats to ErikH for winning the set up, pickups, and iGuitar upgrade kit. PM has been sent.

Also, thanks to all of you for participating in this cool series. We're going to take next week off because it's Business Planning Week for Seymour Duncan managers. But we'll be back in two weeks with another exciting guest (actually, guests - it'll be a two person tag team).

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Do not worry about the delays! We are appreciate you doing this! Thank you once again.


Now some more questions....
Why was there a name change from Brian Moore Guitars to iGuitar?

With the name "iGuitar" has there been any heat from Apple? Considering they have the iPod, iPhone, etc....

----

We brought in some new investors when we filed the USB patents and they wanted the corporate entity to be a C Corp. Since the emphasis was on the technology and we already owned the iGuitar® trademark, we simply called it iGuitar, Inc.

---

If you make something that helps sell Apple products, Apple is supportive. We have been showing the iGuitar in a number of Apple stores, we have done some joint marketing at a variety of trade shows, promotional DVD's.
Several Apple execs have bought instruments, they seem quite pleased at the moment.

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Which came first the iGuitar name or the iMac?

They were conceived around the same time.

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Cool video Patrick- you may want to edit some of the comments
As far as the technology for education goes, I teach with a laptop, and use my C55 all the time hooked up to the computer (via midi interface) to send music home with students. So, I would probably be a good test for the USB thing.
How does a small company deal with someone like Behringer who comes out with a USB guitar, or someone like Gibson, who promised the world with their hex interface (which I don't think ever really surfaced)?

These are complex issues and will be resolve over time and over money:1:

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

That's really really cool. I could spend hours upon hours messing with that setup.

And you should!

 

[ginormous]

Re: Guest Luthier - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Hello from Paducah, KY!

Pat, it's great to see you carrying on the tradition of cutting-edge invention and creativity, as seen with Les Paul, Leo Fender, Seth Lover, not to mention our dear Mr. D.

Along with willeubanks (a fellow forum user), I would also be quite interested in an iBass. What I see as necessary would be a wide tonal versatility -- everything from smooth acoustic bass to roaring hard rock overdrive, with crisp slap and articulate fingerstyle along the way.

From what I understand of MIDI, sometimes it can be difficult for dynamics in pitch, attack and sustain to be accurately transferred into data. How does iGuitar succeed over previous technologies?

 

[Patrick Cummings]

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

Re: LIVE NOW - Patrick Cummings of iGuitar (formerly Brian Moore Custom)

That's really funny... because I remember "comfort" being a large part of the conversation we had about that instrument! At that point I had been playing the same Hamer for a few years and he had spent many years with that Strat... and we both seemed to agree that our respective instruments felt like home & anything else felt weird, but that MC1 was just right.

This was probably 1997 or therebouts...

At the time, I recall that there were some more 'traditional' instruments with alder or ash bodies, still with the curved top but there was like a H/S/S setup or something like that in the line. USA made.

Was that more challenging to build then a regular old Strat? Or about the same?

And where are the i2000's made? USA or overseas?

----
We originally offered a few C-Series models in Alder and Ash
----
To get the 'comfort contoured body' we have the extra step of putting a radius over the top of the body and then we glue up the maple top.
----
As it says on the back of the headstock, the i2000 and iGuitar models are 'handcrafted' by our amazing factory in Seoul, Korea