Bela Fleck

It all started with a phone call. Tammy answered, talked for a minute and called to me, "Chuck, Bela Fleck is on the phone." I thought maybe she was teasing me. It turns out that it really was Bela Fleck.

Bela explained that while he was at the Black Banjo gathering earlier in the year he played the banjo Bob Carlin had purchased from our shop, #100. He liked it and wanted a similar one. We would make a few changes along the way and it turned out nicely.

We used the same peghead as #100 to give more inlay room. The inlay of a Girl playing the Banjo under the Moon turned out to be a favorite, so it went on the peghead. Waverly 2-Band tuners on the peghead and Waverly Planetary tuner on the 5th string. We went with off-set Abalone position dots on the radiused Macassar Ebony 25.5 inch scale fingerboard . The neck was to be Cherry, like #100, with Purpleheart/Maple/Padauk veneers on both sides of the center strip and under the fingerboard.

The rim is a 12" sunken/recovered Maple with a tone ring of the same wood added to the top and figured Maple rim cap added to the bottom. Overall height is 3 1/2" and 1/2" thick. Nickel Hooks (15), closed ball end nuts, custom shoe screws and No-Knot tailpiece. A TKL Professional Archtop case protects it all.