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In the late 70's I lived in Escondido CA and wanted to buy a guitar, so at lunch one day I stopped into a nearby guitar shop to take a look at what they had. It turned out to be more of a repair shop than a retail location and strangely the walls were lined with Dobro's. A guy was getting his repaired Dobro returned so I had to wait, but when the repairman handed him the guitar he looked inside and said, "Oh darn, I'd hoped you'd sign it". That was weird, but the repairman said he was sorry and hadn't known he'd wanted him to sign it, so he wrote his name on a card and told him to have it engraved. The name was John Dopera (the shortened name). I was stunned and knew who he was from an article I'd read in Guitar Player magazine. So after the customer left I got to spend more than an hour talking with him about the Dobro's in the shop, the history and some stories behind some of his best work. I remember he'd made a very elaborate Dobro for Nixon's inauguration that had been returned because it was too expensive of a gift (over 25k in 70's money). He also mentioned that his brother was sick in Palomar Hospital at the time and wasn't expected to survive. I was late getting back to work, but it was worth it and remains a very special memory for me.

I just found your channel & I couldn’t be happier!

Excellent introduction to history of resonators and the people involved. Look forward to more soon hopefully

Great job and presentation ❤

While filmed two years ago, I just watched this video today. Not sure how this slipped through my KZfaq watching, but better late than never. Martin, I really enjoyed this story and it increased my appreciation of how resonator guitars have become mainstream instruments. Having said this, I’m guessing that the vast majority of guitars sold today are wood bodied acoustic or electric. And when I visit Music Stores in my corner of the world (Ottawa) there are often either no resonators for sale or a few Asian made resonators. Last time I checked, there are only two or three music stores in Canada that sell National Resophonic guitars. It’s a wonder how I learned to love their look and sound, but is a reflection I suppose of my love of Delta/Countey blues. Thank you so much for your generous contribution of time in the making of your videos, I sincerely enjoy them and continue to learn a lot from them. Cheers from Ottawa, Canada.

Absolutely brilliant 👍

I think the moral of the story is, when George's and John's get together they change the world😉

That was great, it definitely put me on track with the history of resonators.

Thx for such an interesting and informative video

Great video. I just picked up my first National last week, a polychrome tricone and it's a lovely thing. I'm also Leeds based like you (well Wetherby to be exact)

I used to listen to "border radio" in the 1930s. These were high powered stations in Mexico near the Texas border. They played country music and sold sheep dip and $1.98 cures for impotence and guitar lessons and piano lessons and other necessities of the time. I had no idea what a resonator was and soon they were replaced by hideous electric twangs. Thanks for the excellent lesson. Cheers from Texas.

Beautiful.

This was a very thorough history of resonators in America. I'm surprised you didn't mention Amistar though as franz Jontek or something like that made some high quality resonators tricones etc before he passed away. Not sure if they are still a company. From Czech Republic. If you can find one grab it! tom from Maine

Hi Martin , A really interesting video and a great idea, thank you for sharing.

Very interesting historical background. Thanks for your research and taking the time to create the video.

This is a very interesting history. I work on 100 year old pocket watches and have found there history very enlightening also. To find out how we got where we are today is a worthy endeavor! Thank You

Thank you so much!

Many Thanks !

Thanks for this wonderful presentation and history class!

excellent overview... thanks... just purchased an National M1 Tricone to accompany my National Resolectric... love those axes...

Thanks a lot. This helped me greatly to understand the origins of what we see today in the resonator market.

I really enjoyed this “documentary”. Very informative. Thanks.

dobro means good in Slavic languages, respectively in the native language of the Dopier people, good, greetings from Slovakia

Very valuable information, indeed... I may say.. Thanks for the effort then.. Then.., I subscribed..!! See ya. Bertrand.

Thanks a lot! Exactly what I was looking for.

Utterly interesting! We have a 1932 National Triolian and I was looking for some history about it. I have enjoyed and learned a lot. Thank you!

Thank you! As a proud [boutique brand] resonator guitar owner I found this very informative. 👍

Busker are now defunct but like Michael Messer they exercised quality control and set them up in the uk (Wales to be exact) I have one and love it. Definitely not to be confused with Ozark etc. Great video though. Thanks 😊

Fantastic video and a lovely idea. I’ll be looking forward to more!

coming from someone that now owns a number of resonators . a 2008 nrp duco 12th fret, a republic brass body parlor size guitar, I MM Blues 12th fret. and a 12 string tri cone that is out of the same factory as the republic . ( I agree with you about teh MM guitars 100% they are fantastic for the money ). I recently got the chance to play a brass body mule. now I'm willing to sell all my other guitars to get it. while they are all fantastic the mule had a sound unlike anything I've heard ( old or new ) I played 3 cords and had to stop playing to process what i was hearing and it was the only guitar I've ever played where I felt sick to my stomach when leaving it . I've went to bed and and woke up with the sound of that mule ringing in my head for 2 months. . I hope to get my hands on a mule someday soon. thank you so much for this great video.

Very informative and interesting thanks for sharing

Good stuff. Thanks for the download. I love learning about the history of the resonator guitar. I will have to acquire the Makin book to learn more.

Incredibly informative, thanks!

Very helpful, very interesting, thanks!

I just watched this video on my TV. I appreciate the detail. Though I am no professional historian, I have read pretty much all of it scattered among different sources. I would add one thing you almost mentioned. That was the tricone model under a single cone style cover plate intended to be a less expensive three cone model. You start to describe it but move on to something else. As I understand it. That is the prototype that is the model for the Mule Tricone, of which I own one. The other minor issue I have is what you said about pricing for older instruments in the 70, 80s and 90s. I bought my first Dobro at "The Folkstore" in Seattle in 1970. It was an old Dobro. I paid $150. I got my first Weissenborn (a Kona) there the same year for $100. The point is they were cheap because the market was quite small, while the supply of older instruments, found in hock shops and attics was large. I regularly bought Nationals and Dobros into the early 80s paying no more that $500 or so. In 1988, I bought a 1930 squareneck National Style 2 Tricone for $900. It was only in the early 2000s that prices for the originals got beyond my working man's budget.

I love your videos. So helpful for a resonator-beginner such as me, getting to know my Gretsch Honeycomb better and better, and, with the help of your videos, getting a broader perspective on history, maintenance and playing! If you ever happen to come to/gig in Switzerland, please let me know!

Great video. I own two National Resonator guitars now. Great insight. Keep it up.

Manfred Mann Pretty Flamingo was the first time I heard one 1966

Bravo! Leave it to the Brits to give us engaging and quality content on music history! Thanks! Dr. Dennis, Bluegrass Ukulele

Great video. Thank you so much.

Got me a '29 Dobro. Sounds beautiful.

You guys are the bomb. This is the perfect companion to Bob Brozman's book on the National company. And a strong hint that I should spend as much time with my Tricone as I do with my Selmac! PS where, or who do you get all this stuff from? Your presentation is superb, but I do like to potter around with prime sources from time to time!

Hi Martin, you have just cost me £74!! I've ordeed Mark Makin's book. I'm a singer of manily more modern American sing-songwriter material butalso Hokum stuff from the 20s and 30s. I have a passion for the designs (if not the originals) of pre 1934 American acoustic guitars (e.g.. my dreadnoughts are of the 1931 style) and I also own a Gibson made Dobro Mod.27 squareneck, "corrected" by Dave King to have a corrected intonation, and wi a Beard cone and correcting spider (apparently all original Gibson made dobros were made with intonation way out). I also have a National -Resophinc Estralita which followed a beautiful Style "O" deluxe (which I now miss) For fun and interest I have been working on a timeline of acoustic guitar development over the 20th century. I've been taking notes on your mentioned dates in this video and when tme permits, I'll incorporate them with what i have so far, but I see that there are some variances already. I have had the Bob Brozman book and met him two/three times, but I fund it rather difficult to get some of the details from it. I decided to start my timeline from Martin's formation in 1833 but stop it at 1999 as the 21st C seems so complicated, and I really feel that the first 33 or so years of the 20th C were the most innovative. (before electrics came along and spoiled the fun!) I am currently trying to comile information about the German/Czech industry for the 20th century which was of course badly affected by a couple of wars and the soviet union. We seem to have similr intersts in the instruments, and i wonder whether you might like to compare notes and info at some time? My KZfaq channel contains an email address on the "about" page. Thanks for an interesting video and I look forward to watching more of your videos - both musical and historical (I started my channel just to show my trio the numbers I wanted to play then it kinda went into history and preferences and such. Regards!

Thanks!

Great video. You can tell the difference between the newer instruments and the old ones. You also want to look into an instrument named a "Pedabro" which is a combination of a pedal steel and resonator guitar (dobro style). Hideously expensive and rare these days but sound unique and a good part of the history of both instruments. A lot of country hits were recorded on them in the 80s and 90s.

This is as good as it gets.

Great video. Thumbs up. As you live in Leeds, I just want to ask you if you have met the great Steve Phillips who, we all know has formed back in the day, the Duolian String Pickers alongside with MK, and being a National guitars expert. And by the way, I enjoyed the very first few notes you played from Can't Be Satisfied.

Enjoyed this, thank you, always good to get a historical perspective on the instruments we play and love. I have a number of resonators, wood and metal, the most interesting being a little known brass bodied (silver plated) style 0 type I bought from an international guitar dealer 25 years ago. It's a Paul Reisner (spelling might be off), this guy making instruments in or around Paris at the latter part of WW2 up to the 1960's, or so I'm led to understand. It's a quality instrument with a Selmer type tailpiece similar to those on Selmer Django Reinhard style acoustic guitars. I'd like to find out more but info really sketchy. It plays well and sounds good, I love its sweet, but dark smoky blues blues tones. My one also has a bullet hole passing through the lower bout and interesting story attached. I think it's an early model. BTW I also love playing washboard and a whole lot of mixed percussion, so good to find your channel and what you do!!

Donmo resonator guitars are quite good. Made in Australia by Don Morrison (Donmo). Made from recycled galvanized roof sheets and also some from old copper water tanks.

I see you don't own a National Hawaiian guitar like Sol Hoopii played. Thank you for your video

I’m really curious what you were alluding to when you were holding the (I’m assuming bob brozeman) book at the end when you said you’ve “heard some things” lol

Great video, truly informative... I could only add that, beside cheap chinese copies (with poor quality, stamped and not spun, cones and low-end alloys), some interesting efforts were made to recreate National guitars. Amistar (Czech rep.) and Republic (partly US and China made) are rather good (mid priced) instruments. British luthier Mike Lewis (Fine Resophonics) also makes wonderful replicas of Tricones and Style O, in his Paris workshop : his models (professional grade, and NOT cheap) are as good as new US National guitars. He spins his own cones and uses noble alloys (german silver and brass). He, also, is pretty innovative with his superb wooden tricone... Anyway, what a wonderful collection! I'm deadly jealous...

Hi, thanks for the video. I am just about to buy my first Resonator. I am looking to produce the sound of the Mississippi Delta Blues. What do you recommend for me? Perhaps, there could be three price ranges $0 to $1,000 and $1,001 to $2,000 and $2,001 and up! Thank you in advance.

Thanks for this. I thought this was fascinating. I came to see you guys play at the bear club in Luton last year. We chatted about guitars, mark knopfler and Steve Philips in the interval and you VERY kindly let me have a go on one of your guitars and your banjolele.

...Hey, I got to the 7:32 min. mark and thought, How many really old guitars do you own ? I'm both jealous and pissed simultaneously. I want one.

Great video. I want to try a resonator, but like most people I don't have much money to put into it. Is it worth buying a cheap one to start?

❤

I heard the Bob Brozman book talks about setups alittle bit, I've been contemplating buying that book for months just to see what he has to say about setups (nut, saddle, action etc) but It's quite expensive and I'm not sure if its just a sentence or two about setups or a whole chapter dedicated to it. Could you possibly look to confirm or deny?

Washboard resonators don’t forget bluegrass music they uses dobro square neck ones

What about the Dopera’s Original?

Super Job Martyn, enjoyed the video immensely, maybe a little more of a tune might be nice, more please, stay safe, see you after lockdown. 1940sradio.com

You have a Mule or ever played one?

"Dobro" means "good" in slavic languages.

I had to stop watching this 3 minutes in. Why on Earth would anyone pronounce "patent" like that? 🤨 If you meet a person named Pat, do you call them Pate, Payt, or Pait?

Just tuned in to see if the history of dobro has been black washed yet, like the black washing of the banjo.

As usual this bloody of talking. Got really tired.

I really like the banjos and guitars