BELOW: The Charles Fox-designed Universal
Side Bending Machine has become a go-to tool
for acoustic luthiers all over the world.
RIGHT: This Ergo features cocobolo back and
sides, a Honduran mahogany neck, and a Gabon
ebony fretboard, in addition to an elevated
fingerboard and a compound cutaway that
gently twists the surface away from your
fretting hand and brings it flush with
the tapered heel.
BELOW: Fox’s patented
unibody design features
back and sides with a
Brazilian rosewood exterior,
an aircraft-foam core, and a
three-ply laminate interior.
significant new guitar-making
trends—Linda Manzer’s wedge-shaped body, the late Tom
Humphrey’s elevated fretboard
and negative-pitch top, Grit
Laskin’s side sound port, Abe
Wechter’s removable access
panel, Jeff Elliott’s compound
cutaway, etc.—and combine
them with things I’d been
exploring. Things like mono-coque/unibody construction
[Ed. note: Monocoque designs
support the stresses put upon them
through their exterior shells rather
than through interior bracing],
braceless double-top steel-string
soundboards, removable necks,
and so on. The idea was to synthesize these elements in a form
representing my own take on
the state of the art. One motivation for the project was the
challenge that its unusual architecture posed. I was bored with
the more-or-less conventional
construction I had worked
with for so long, and I needed
to shake things up and stretch
a little. On a different note, I
wanted the Ergo Noir, with its
piano-black soundboard, ebony
binding, and red pinstriping,
to at least hint at life’s erotic
dimension. I don’t know how
clear that is to everyone, but for
those of us who are of a certain
sensibility, she is a sexy beast.
The Luthiers Mercantile cata-
log offers the Fox Universal
Side Bending Machine, the Fox
Bridge Clamp, and a few other
tools you created that have
pretty much become workshop
standards now. Can you tell us
a little about how they were
developed and whether you’ve
got tools in the works?
It’s satisfying to contribute
something useful to one’s craft.
Today’s rich approach to guitar
making is the result of contribu-
tions from hundreds of luthiers
thinking “What if . . . ?” As a
teacher, I’m a bit more public
than my inventive colleagues,
and my students go on to share
with others what they learn
from me, which helps account
for the modest influence of
my innovations. Regardless, I
have this reputation as a tool
maker—the Jig Meister—and
my approach to guitar making
is certainly weighted toward
the use of simple, easily made
devices that make the work
more efficient, accurate, consis-
tent, and, of course, of higher
overall quality. I teach jig- and
fixture-design principles that
others can apply to their own
needs in their own shops.
When did you build your first
guitar, and what drove you to
get into lutherie?
I built my first guitar in the
mid 1960s. Today’s thriving artisan guitar-making
