UkeTalk Interview with
Peter Hurney of Pohaku Ukulele
May 2006

Q: Peter, how long have you been building ukes and what got you started?

Peter Hurney: Before I had ever built a ukulele I had built wooden drums and marimbas, a couple of fiddles and bass guitars. I built my first ukuleles shortly after moving to Hawaii in the early 1990’s. By 1994 I was making pretty decent instruments and it’s been a trip ever since. I recently completed my 300th ukulele.

Q: I noticed that your website exhibits some electric guitars and basses built by you. Are you still building other instruments?

PH: I have and still do occasionally make an instrument other than ukuleles but really I avoid doing it. I’m known for my ukuleles and am very good and familiar in making them and just as important, I have a market for them.

Q: In addition to your standard ukulele lines, you're one of the few luthiers I know of who build what I'd call "theme ukuleles". I've seen Betty Boop, Japanese Woodcut, ancient woods, and other interesting ukes on your website. How did you get hooked on these art forms of building?

PH: Musical Instruments are art. My instrument decorating is a blending of my disciplines, tastes and skills. I’ve taken too many art classes and this combined with musical instrument building has proven to be a workable mix. Most of my designs are originals but I am definitely inspired by those who have come before me and I am equally inspired by the muses I collect while traveling through life. Besides being attractive, decorated instruments are fun. I have recently been adding decorative inlay work onto my instruments. Several of my longtime luthiers friends have been encouraging me to try my hand at it and so far the results have been very encouraging.

Q: And you're also building resonator ukes?

PH: Resonator Instruments? Resonator Instruments rock! It’s that blend of wood and hubcap that could only have happened in America. They aren’t the instrument for everyone but when the music and playing style is right they find a good home. I love the resonator ukulele design which I came up with. I made a handful of working prototypes over a five year period before arriving at my current model which is significantly different from other contemporary resonator ukulele designs. I use a spider bridge, which gives better note clarity with slightly less volume than biscuit bridge models. The styling of my instruments is inspired by 20’s and 30’s art deco Bakelite radios. I vacuum form my own cover plates out of ABS and I fabricate and engrave my own brass tailpieces.

Q: Is there an ideal model that you base your standard ukulele designs on?

PH: All my instruments are my own design and all my designs are continually evolving. However, they are all influenced on what I thought to be successful ukuleles in their categories. The tenor is influenced mostly by Kamaka although its body shape is somewhat Martin and my concert model is like nothing else. I was most impressed by the Koaloha concert ukulele when I was designing my instrument. I liked their flat frequency response quality. The only instruments which I’ve dead-copied are the little soprano (Martin) and my (Harmony) aero-uke. There’s no sense or reason for me to build a Kamaka or a Martin, if someone wants a Kamaka or a Martin they should buy one. It’s my place to build a Pohaku.

Q: Did you study the building styles of any one luthier, or is your work a collected effort of the study of many?

PH: My knowledge of acoustics, physics, mechanics, wood working, string instrument building and in particular ukulele building has more varied influences than your average congressman has in an entire career. My knowledge has come from a very wide range of people and sources and I thank all the people who have helped me in understanding each and every discipline.

Q: Are you a one-man shop, or do you have apprentices?

PH: I am willing to take on apprentices as long as they’re small, funny, don’t smell bad and are willing to work for free. At the moment I work alone.

Q: Do you build one instrument at a time, or do you pre-produce bridges, necks, etc?

PH: I work in small batches of four to six similar instruments at a time. Any more gets boring and any less is an inefficient use of time. I do my best work when I can flow through the process smoothly rather than getting bogged down by too much of the tedious work (sanding and finishing). I learned not to pre-produce too many parts ahead of time because whenever I do that I’ll sure as hell change my mind on my design by the time the parts are exhausted. But that’s what eBay is for.

Q: Regarding volume and tonal differences, how do you feel about the differences in 12 fret versus 14 fret ukuleles?

PH: Personally, if I play past the fifth fret I figure that I’m doing something wrong. However, twelve or fourteen frets isn’t a question so much about volume or tone as it is about player’s requirements. Surely any change one does to an instrument is going to alter its characteristics, especially a change as drastic as lengthening the neck and changing the bridge placement (and/or scale length) to give the players the extra frets they want. So in a pragmatic approach to building, first give the ukulele players the frets that they want and then figure out how to make the instrument sound, feel and look good. And although I vary as times change, I am currently joining both my concerts and my tenors between the 13th and the 13th and a half fret which gives players the fret access they want while it allows me to use a bridge placement and a scale length I feel works well in each instrument.

Q: Do you feel that the size or material of the bridge make a difference in the sound of the instrument?

PH: There was a good acoustical study in the early 80’s by Eric V. Jannisson published by the Royal Swedish Academy of Music examining amongst other aspects of guitar acoustics the effects of variables in guitar construction. Among the variables, bridge designs were studied. An instrument in this study was scientifically evaluated for certain quality criteria such as: the quality factor of the 1st resonance, peak levels of second and third resonances, and average levels of the third octaves at various frequency ranges. The bridge which had been temporarily glued on would be removed and replaced with one of a different design and the instrument would then be reevaluated Approaching the ukulele with the assumption that I am looking for strong harmonics and not strong fundamentals in the lower frequencies, I have been swayed by the study’s results in the design of my bridge with favorable results. A short light bridge gives me the best outcome on a ukulele. Concerns with string instrument bridges are that there has to be enough gluing surface to keep it from lifting plus it has to work in conjunction with your bracing pattern to both use the strings’ vibrating power efficiently and it can’t distort or crack the top. For the last couple of years or so I have been leaning more and more towards using a string through bridge which I am calling a pinless bridge. I notice that a few other makers are also starting to use this too. Basically the string gets inserted through a little hole in the bridge just below the saddle and is fished up through the soundhole where a knot gets tied and the string gets pulled back taut to where the knot rests on a thin hardwood bridge patch on the underside of the soundboard. I am finding this system to have many advantages over traditional ukulele bridge designs. There are no pokey string ends, it’s visually very tidy and it allows me to use bridge designs that otherwise wouldn’t be possible. Sufficient gluing surface isn’t an issue (as the bridge doesn’t even really need glue to hold itself on), and more control can be exercised in string break angle and the amount of torque the bridge is subjected to.

Q: Do you utilize tap-tuning in your building process or do you work with specific thicknesses?

PH: When I thickness ukulele plates on my thickness sander I sand to a specified thickness, put the calipers aside and take off the last ten or so thousandths by feel. My braces get shaved after the top has been glued onto the body of the instrument, with tap tuning guiding my work.

Q: One of the pictures on your website exposes the soundboard bracing pattern. The uke in that picture has fan bracing carved pretty flat with no bridgeplate. It also had side braces. Is that your general bracing system?

PH: I really must remove that picture. That is an old Kamaka style bracing pattern, which I don’t use anymore. Almost exclusively I use some variation of a classical fan bracing scheme.

Q: What's the weirdest wood type you've ever used, and how well did it work?

PH: Recently I built a couple of fantastic ukuleles out of Kauri wood which was carbon dated at 30,000 to 50,000 years old and is currently being salvaged from a New Zealand peat bog. It is a species of giant trees still currently growing in New Zealand. In ancient times a stand of these trees sunk into a peat bog and have been suspended for eons in a unique set of environmental conditions which has preserved the wood in a fully workable condition. This is not only the most unique wood I have worked with but it’s got to be one of the most unusual woods that anyone has ever worked with. It made great sounding instruments too. Typically though, I will stick with the conventional woods used in instrument building: koa, mahogany, maple and the like. They are our standard woods for many good reasons. Many players will think of tone and looks as prime considerations in wood choices, which they are, but from builder’s viewpoint equally important criteria is strength, glue-ability and stability. The woods, which are our industry standards have, not by accident, these important properties.

Q: Do you entertain on the uke as well as build them?

PH: I do not entertain on the ukulele because you would not be entertained. I am a player, but not a musician. I also can’t sing worth a damn which for most ukulele players is an important part of playing unless you’re Jake Shimabukuro or Lyle Ritz. I enjoy playing a little bass guitar and on occasion I revert to playing drums which were my first instrument. A few years ago, in the interest of space and nostalgia I built a set of cocktail drums which are way cool. A cocktail drum set, as compared with a full trap set is an abbreviated minimal set of drums usually incorporating an upright bass drum which has its kick pedal reversed to hit the drum head on its underside. Cocktail sets can be played sitting down or standing up.

Q: What styles of ukulele music do you favor, and do you have a favorite artist?

PH: I like the mainland 20’s – 40’s sound on the ukulele. The not too jazzy but swingy styles of Lyle Ritz, and Bill Tapia are a great use of the instrument. Check out the new girl from Green Bay, Wisconsin, Victoria Vox. Some of the music on her debut ukulele CD really fits into where I think the ukulele sounds great. The ukulele has a lovely little voice of its own and I enjoy hearing it best when it is used as an accompanying instrument. However, in the privacy of your own home it’s a wonderful thing to pick up in the living room and amuse oneself with. It’s so easy!

Q: I know from previous conversations with you that you're from New England. How did you happen to start Pohaku Ukulele in Hawaii, and how did you end up in California?

PH: Yes, I was fortunate enough to grow up in beautiful New England but upon reaching adulthood I realized that the place was climatically challenged and moved to the milder climate of San Francisco.

I drifted south into Southern California and then jogged over into the next state of Hawaii with my wife, Geralyn where I finally found an ideal climate where one can wear shorts and ‘T’ shirts year round! My wife started a degree program while in Hawaii and there came a time when we had to move back to America for her to complete her degree, which eventually brought us back into California. Presently we live in Berkeley, which is an awfully nice community and has a fair climate. Hawaii however, lingers in my mind as a place to live again sometime in the future.

Q: I also notice on your website that you're a collector of ukulele art. Can you tell us a bit about that?

PH: That’s the result of a combination of art and musical instrument interests. I keep my eyes open for such artwork. I really don’t have too much, I try not to be an avid collector. In fact, I had to borrow a bunch of basic but significant ukulele and Hawaiiana artwork from Andy Andrews (of the Ukulele Club of Santa Cruz) for a display I participated in staging in downtown Berkeley’s “Addison Street Window Gallery” last winter. You can see pictures of this display on my website.

Coming soon to my website is my collection of non-ukulele related artwork I have personally created or have participated in creating with other artists over the years. It’s a kind of personal retrospective encompassing a wide range of eclectic artwork including participation in Christo’s Umbrella project, a reproduction of Vincent Van Gogh’s chair to automata sculptures I have been collaborating on.

Also coming to my website will be articles I have published over the years in various musical instrument magazines including “The Journal of the Guild of American Luthiers” and “Experimental Musical Instrument Magazine”.

Q: I understand that you're in the planning stages of developing a ukulele radio show; is it too early to talk about that?

PH: I’m a volunteer producer at KALX, which is the radio station of the University of California, Berkeley. I currently write and produce public service announcements, promos, ID’s and themes, and being a university station a twist is expected and necessary in our programming. We don’t want people hearing the same thing that they’d hear on commercial radio, which is where I come in handy. Although besides myself I must say that we have got a great team of twisted talent at the station. I incorporate as much ukulele music as I can into my productions and I promote the ukulele and present its music when DJ’s allow me to invade their airtime. I encourage all the DJ’s I have contact with to air ukulele music on their shows and lord help us when they turn me loose as a DJ, Berkeley will get a larger dose of the ukulele. The show I have in the forming stage is a half hour weekly showcase of alternative instruments with everybody’s favorite, “ The ukulele minute” at the end of each show featuring live performances. So stay tuned and keep your dial locked to 90.7 FM.; also on the web at http://kalx.berkeley.edu/