Posted: Mon Mar 05, 2007 7:16 am
I got my best gig bag in a strange way. Ten years ago, I was teaching school in Indonesia. I went there to be near my ex-wife's parents, so our daughters could be with their grandparents. (We divorced eight years after we left.) Anyway, my mother-in-law was browsing in, of all things, one of my TUBA Journals. She saw an ad for Reunion Blues gig bags, with a picture. She said, "Bill, do you want one of these?" I thought she was joking. Of course, I told her yes. She said she needed to borrow my tuba for about six hours. Since I was on a three week break from school, I had nothing to do, so I watched what she did with a tuba. She measured that horn about the same way the tailor measured me when I bought a couple of suits here in Saigon. Then, she made some paper patterns, looking something like Simplicity or McCall's clothing patterns. She was right. It took about six hours. Next, she had me take the tuba to an AUTOMOBILE UPHOLSTERY SHOP. I was shown several kinds of covering material. I chose a brown Naugahyde. The man there said the bag would be ready in two days, but he had to keep the tuba. I ended up only paying for materials, about 25 bucks. It's a great bag!
