Make your own Finnish Style Kantele!
5, 10 and 15 string instruments
Kantele making CD, Downloads, Plans
New Kantele making CD
The complete resource for the aspiring kantele maker, This CD runs from any Web Browser, on any windows Mac or Linux computer, just like a normal website.
It contains 5 sets of plans on CD in PDF format, along with construction guide in web format, MP3 sound samples (now with a couple of video files) plus the playing guide.
The 2008 version availabelfrom march has a 45 minute Kantele making diaryplus video playing guide.
(I will make some of this available on Youtube for preview)
The Kantele Making CD working in Ubuntu Linux (a free Microsoft Xp/Vista alternative) and xp below:
Kantele Making CD (2008 Version)
£15.00 Including Postage/Shipping anywhere in the world
(Click on the link below to pay)
DOWNLOADS
Kantele Construction Guide Original PDF Version
for £2.00 ($5 approx)
The current Kantele making CD is far more comprehensive but this ebook is fine if you want to find out quickly about whats involved in making them. please note:This is the original 2003/4 PDF 5 String Kantele guide by itself(no Plans), you can download the plans for an additional £2.00
(BTW The PDF ebook edition (2004) was reviewed here)
5 String Kantele plans (2 pdf files zipped for download)
The original 5 string plans, to be printed on tracing paper, available for download for £2.00
Other ways to pay
For customers in the UK, I can also recieve payment by cheque or postal order.
For customers without Paypal/Credit cards you can simply send the money in cash in your ocal currency(dollars , euros etc), sent discreetly with a covering note with your name and address.
Printing the Plans
You may need to play with the settings of your printer to get the printout right, usually if you use adobe reader, set at 100% you should be ok. Some people with very high definition printers found they had to lower the print quality to get a clearer printout.
If the plans are out of scale by 1 or two mm then I wouldnt worry, one of the nice things of making an open strung instrument is that you have more freedom with measurements and stringing, When I first began this project I was tempted not to include any measurements at all, in the spirit of the original Finnish makers working by eye, within the tradtion, but in the end I have included enough to keep most happy while still working to a template system of construction. several people making this instrument as their first musical instrument leave out some of the decorative features, like the bird head, or rebate on the underside of the head.
To use the plans Simply Print these off onto tracing paper
using your
own printer, match up the printouts and tape together! I have
left a big overlap to cover different paper sizes and also to aid
collating the drawings.
I will be adding customers Kanteles in the near future