Made from a stick, some wire and adiscarded old cigar box, the Cigar Box Guitar is about as simple and unassuming as an instrument can be.  Yet, homegrown and humble as it is, the cigar box guitar has played an essential role in our nation’s musical history. From its origins around the 1880's through the depression of the 1930's, it has symbolized the triumph of ingenuity.  Many well-known performers in our history, with no money for a store-bought guitar began their musical journey by cobbling one together.  Lightnin' Hopkins, Roy Clark and Ritchie Valens to name just a few. 

Today there is a resurgent interest in the cigar box guitar.  A growing number of instrument builders and performers serve as a reminder to our ultra-commercial, high tech society that great music doesn't require a $3,000 brand-name guitar, and doesn't have to filter through corporate Hollywood or Nashville.

Fingerlakes Fest - or the 1st Annual Fingerlakes Celebration of the Cigarbox Guitar, was among one of the very first initial gatherings of those people connected to the cigar box guitar movement.  Performers, builders and musical enthusiasts came together in Canandaigua, NY on Oct 3rd and 4th 2008.

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