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Want to build your own (cheap) acoustic guitar pickup? Well, Instructables has a fantastic tutorial on how to do exactly that:

The first step is to design and create your pickup. The heart of the pickup is a piezo buzzer element. You can find these for just a couple dollars at your local parts store. (Radio Shack) Sometimes the Piezo Buzzer packages don’t have that much information on them, but you want to find things as close as possible to the information listed on the “Specs:” page. In other words, they are pretty cheap so go for a good one. Also note that you do not need a fully functional buzzer device… just the Piezo element.

 Hit this link for the rest of the tutorial.Â

Of all the things to patent! Something that combines two of my favorite subjects–telephony and music. Apparently a guy has applied for a patent that lets you use your cell phone like a musical instrument, and even play songs for your fans on the other end of the call. No joke. Here’s the scoop from New Scientist:

The phone has the usual four rows of keys, but switching to music mode turns the keys into a set of virtual strings that respond to pressing. Turning a control knob shifts the scale of the selected chord up or down – like a guitar capo – or switches between different types of chord, like major and minor.

The guitar phone can be played live, to adoring fans, or a melody can be composed in private and stored in memory for use as a ring tone or meeting reminder. Motorola says the phone could even be converted into a banjo or violin at the flick of a switch, with strings automatically retuning. I fear duelling banjos in every pub.

(Image linked from some guy’s cool Guitar Objects site.)