Jouhikko project: Prologue

Years and years ago, one of my crafting inspirations (who currently is living the dream as a blacksmith down in Pennsylvania), built a Sutton Hoo lyre, and I thought that was the coolest thing. I've played instruments since I was but single digits of age, and the art of constructing an instrument was something I never thought I'd be able to do on my own. But, to be able to have a period Viking instrument (or as close as possible to one, more on that later) would be amazing.

A few years later, my dad and I built a CnC machine. I used it for several projects, but it eventually fell victim to the need for streamlining and some construction difficulties with the gantry. I never got around to my goal of CADing out a lyre and carving one that way. Not only would that solve my confidence issues, in that all the precision work would have been done by a robot, but it would also eliminate most of the need for tools - at the time, I lived in a literal hotel room. 

So, that dream languished for probably most of a decade. I got to handle one of the lyres on a return visit to my old friend's neck of the woods, but that was as close as I came. 

Last year, I discovered what a tagelharpa was, along with its structural twin, the jouhikko. Not only was the rustic droning sound fantastic, it filled essentially the same niche as a regular lyre for something portable and period I could take to bardics. My old beat-up ukulele (which I had re-tuned as a mandolin stand-in) just wasn't the same, obviously. The jouhikko would also be nice because I have ten years of fiddle experience; thus, I wouldn't have to worry about that part of the learning curve. 

I also found a website that claimed to sell bowed lyres on sale for about $300, which was a fairly affordable price. Lesson learned - don't buy from Staghelm, no matter how good the price is. As of 2024, I don't think anyone on Reddit can prove they've produced a single instrument in the last year, and they certainly didn't make mine. They also didn't make an effort to dispute paypal the second time, so at least I got my money back. But, on the way back from GWW last year, I got into a conversation on Facebook with another SCAdian named Patrick. We'd met briefly at the one event I had gone to in his neck of the woods, and I was impressed with his selection of instruments (which probably included the jouhikko, but I didn't retain the info at the time). But we hadn't really interacted since until we ended up talking about my Staghelm that was probably going to need some TLC if and when it arrived. 

Fast forward to December, Patrick and I met in a coffee shop one morning. It was an absolutely chaotic trip, given that his city is easier to reach by plane than car, but I came back with a loaner jouhikko. That turned into an opportunity to talk more about instruments and their design and building, which culminated in an invitation to Patrick's shop in June. It was, again, something of a chaos trip, given that it was the single free weekend for a month on either side of it, but we had a grand time getting my instruments roughed out. Since then, I've been on my own to do the remaining work. My woodworking time has been divided between 20 minute at a time borrowing the shop at work, and a few weekends of actual work time on the porch.

This is my most complex bit of woodwork so far, and I've put a great lot of thought into it, so this will probably be multiple blog posts as I catch the documentation up to my actual progress.

Many thanks to Patrick, without whom I would undoubtedly be flailing about blindly.