How to tell your story

[Herman]

Last week I was for a drink at my neighbours. With the one I made the Jazzbass for. His friends were also there and they were so enthousiastic about the guitar I made. My neighbour told that he thinks it is so much better than a storebought one. His friends seem to lay at my feet when I started to tell about it. The ignorant me explained that my neighbour wants a nice Jazz bass. And if you want a guitar sounds like a Jazzbass, you better start with a Jazbassdesign. Hmm, had to make a realitycheck: stupid me.
The comment was: "So you just copy the thing!" And gone was the audience. That much for a masterclass.

They probably expected a mysterious zennish approach. I guess, I have to work on my promotingspeech. The one where I seem to come from another planet. That would sell better.

Guys, give me tips to improve on the matter.
Herman

[Dave Bagwill]

Herman, I sympathize with you.
Of the many possible ways to lay a line of b.s. on non-luthiers, I have chosen the Platonic cosmology. See, right there I have gotten off on the right foot, because I used 'jargon'.

Plato believed that the perfection of a thing lay in its relation to an Ideal Form that existed outside the world. Thus, for instance, even though we have never seen the intangible Form of a horse, the perfect, essential horse, we somehow intuit it, and this enables us to judge the horses we can see, and call them 'excellent' or 'jolly good' or 'this is just a nag'. It is the philosopher, who through diligent study of the 'starry heavens above' and the 'moral law within', is finally able to gaze upon the the true Forms of the good, the true, and the beautiful.

A true Luthier is one who through diligent study, suppression of his natural desires, and the casting aside of worldly lusts, ego-centered activities, and the dross of lesser human activities, finally ascends to the true Gnosis, the true wisdom, the true vision, and gazes upon...yes, the Form of The jazzguitar. Those of us that have achieved it are or course modest, self-giving, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent. And shower once a week.

Having ascended heights of vision that few others will ever attain, we then try our mightiest to bring into tangible reality that which we are now enamored of.

Anyway, I haven't had any coffee yet, or I might really go off on this theme, but you get the gist. I highly recommend Platonic theory (and there is much more to it), especially if others have been drinking heavily so that their critical faculties are perhaps not quite as sharp as those of, say a manatee.

[Tim Benware]

Dave, I didn't know you knew Plato. You ARE old!

[George]

Do you know So-Crates too? ........... I mean Socrates also?

George

[Dave Bagwill]

Tim - we used to go to the public baths together so yes, I knew Plato. He had a million jokes, was fond of young peoplle, and knew a lot of the "nantucket" series of limericks, all of which were ribald, except one:


There once was a man from Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a bucket.
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.

George - Hah!

[Herman]

Dave, thanks, you gave me an idea how to approach my next audience.

Since I am old too I'll first start with Plato thing. How Mr.P thought that I intuitive have a vision of a ultimate devine guitar. But I never saw one, still I have that image how it should look like and how it plays and sounds. Only the utmost devoted energy will help me to make it.

There I got the female part of the public. They dig this stuff.

I keep going with Mr.P till the women lay at my feet and the guys start to walk for more beer. Then I switch to Aristoteles. Mr.A believed that all we know came eventually through our senses. I turn the story to how I select wood. That I feel, tap, sniff and weigh. How body and neck of a jazzbass should fit the players body. How the joy of building reach the summit when spruce and mahogany planes like butter.

There I have the men paying attention.

Toward the end, and the girls are back with their new beverage, I come to the finished guitar. I'll tell the speachless crowd that a good guitar really comes to life. The feel of the laquer, the colors, the view on the smooth curves, and after all the heavenly music. Satisfaction for all our senses.

And there I got the girls again. (Or was it because of the fact that I shower every day and smell like a baby?)

See, I worked it out.
Please guys, follow me to the fridge and then to the pay desk

BTW, Dave, don't push my English this much.

[Dave Bagwill]

Your English is much better than my Dutch!! :-)

I think you have the perfect approach now! Throwing in Aristotle - really he was just a good ol' boy trying to get laid - was a masterful touch! Touche!