Albany musician Eddy Jay turns to 3D printer for new supply of musical instruments

It began as a bet with his father.

Could you make your own concertina?

West Australian musician Eddy Jay decided to give it a try.

"My dad plays the concertina, he's a teacher, a workshop leader in the UK, and he'd been wanting to make his own concertina for decades," he said.

"I wasn't very good at woodwork, so I bought a 3D printer and re-engineered it on a computer.

A professional accordionist, Jay's career has taken him around the globe, including a small village tour across the UK and playing on Broadway in New York.

"I've travelled the world playing the accordion, which is basically a big concertina, but I also tune them," he said.

"I know how they work inside and out, I've had them apart, and I just adapted what I knew."

Ten prototypes for the new instrument were quickly rejected by his dad.

"Then I sold one, and then he wanted one, but he liked his own concertina," Jay said.

"So the concession was that I've printed the top of it in green, but it's actually a real concertina underneath, and he plays that with pride."

Over the past six years, Jay has made dozens of concertinas that have been sent to customers all over the world.

Each takes about a month.

It was indirectly how he met his wife and fellow musician, Josephine, who answered a call-out to deliver a concertina for him.

"I made her a violin, you'll notice the blue, it's the same shade as her eyes, but what's especially distinctive is that it's got an extra string," Jay said.

"We played the violin and my accordion, which is mostly 3D printed as well, at our wedding."

Josephine Jay said it had a unique sound.

"It's very smooth, velvety smooth, every note has this reverberance," she said.

 "It's quieter, but in other ways it's got this beautiful quality that I've never experienced in a wooden violin before."

Trial and error

The new builds have required a lot of experimentation.

"The way the levers work, the way the springs work, the way the buttons work, it's all new," Eddy Jay said.

"I found carbon fibre sounds best, it sounds loudest, sharpest and unfortunately carbon fibre is grey, so it doesn't quite look as nice as my early concertinas, which were pink and green and rainbow coloured."

Jay now holds workshops to share his knowledge.

Knowledge sharing important

Using 3D printing to manufacture instruments is becoming more common and has been used for guitars and flutes in Australia.

Scott Wise is a luthier based in Margaret River who has been building instruments since 1978.

Mr Wise said publicly shared knowledge had always played a major role in the industry, with the platform shifting from magazines and newsletters to YouTube and other social media platforms.

"I was very fortunate in the mid to late 70s. There was an organisation called the Guild of American Luthiers, which was an information-sharing association," he said.

"They published a quarterly magazine that revealed a lot of traditional secrets to us beginners.

"People who had innovative approaches to different things, like how the neck would be attached or different bracing patterns, those kinds of things, those were shared and publicised."

Future challenges

Eddy and Josephine Jay continue to play together at festivals and events around WA, including a song inspired by the musical instrument manufacturing that happens in their home.

"He's got a whole world in his accordion," Jospehine Jay said.

"He can play so many different sounds, but he's very generous with the way that he plays music, and that's such a gift, so I really enjoy playing music with him."

Eddy Jay is now looking to use a CNC [computer numerical control] he made for wood projects.

"I hope to be making wooden violins using that, but using my computer design, and I'm hoping to be making wooden concertinas," he said.

"So there is an irony here; there's a full circle where I'm back to using wood to make beautiful instruments, even though it's using the cutting-edge technology that I feel more comfortable with."