Bryan Jeppson displays his handcrafted guitars during the 15th annual Brookdale Guitar Show that was held at Brookdale Community College, Lincroft, on April 15. LAUREN CASSELBERRY MIDDLETOWN — For one day, the Warner Student Life Center on the Brookdale Community College campus was transformed into a rock ‘n’ roll paradise.
For the 15th year, the Brookdale Guitar Show welcomed thousands of guitar professionals, aficionados and music fans from across the state.
“It’s having a local presence. A lot of my customers, potential and actual customers, are here,” said Eric Lee Collier, who owns Luther Lee, a guitar pick-up manufacturer that has seen praise from headlining acts like Social Distortion and The Gaslight Anthem.
The April 15 guitar show saw crowded aisles and many people wearing T-shirts representing bands and music shops of the past and present.
A father and two sons picked Beatles records out of a milk crate, while a mulletsporting man in a Hawaiian shirt windowshopped down the seemingly endless line of musical equipment.
Collier said the show gave him the opportunity to put his business out there.
“It’s about having an interaction with your customers, moving more into their environment and less into your own,” he said.
Visitors moved by, often doing double takes at a 50-year-old Gibson guitar or the quirky sights that stopped them in their tracks. Many people crowded around the display of Lazy B Cigar Box Guitars.
“You can very simply just glue a stick to a cigar box and stretch a string, but the real trick is making it something that will hold up, stay in tune and be able to gig with. That becomes the tricky part,” said Brick Township based cigar box manufacturer John Bernyk.
Unlike a standard electric guitar, Bernyk uses empty cigar boxes as the base for his instruments. The classic, antique design of the box gives the guitars a retro look, especially with the block-shaped necks protruding from the end.
The first time he saw one, Bernyk wanted to build his own version of this perfect example of a do-it-yourself instrument.
“I always saw them around and I always wanted one. So I bought one online and said, ‘Hey, I think I can make this pretty easily,” Bernyk explained, five years after he built his first cigar box guitar. “I started making them and started incorporating some of my own ideas into it, and this is the finished product.”
Indoor and outdoor stages welcomed performances by rock and folk acts such as Amanda Duncan, the Sonny Kenn Band, and Tommy Strazza.
Another stage showcased clinics from many of the show’s most popular vendors, including longtime attendee and guitar show founder Raritan Bay Guitar Repair, a panel discussion about the process of recording, and a lecture about the history of bass guitar in New Jersey.
But the sounds also came from the vendors themselves, many of whom set up small amplifiers in the corner of their booth.
Chris Szczerbienski, owner of Be Sharp Guitars, had a Les Paul-style guitar hooked up to an amplifier open to anyone who came by to talk shop.
“We can do a lot of crazy stuff with a guitar, especially when it’s electric,” he said .
He said the show offered him the opportunity to network as he prepares to open a guitar repair store in Shrewsbury.
“It’s right in our backyard. Not only are there customers, but other business people I can get to know,” Szczerbienski said.
When asked about turning music from a hobby into a business, he pointed to his own experience.
“I wanted to learn, when my guitar is sounding bad, how to make it sound better,” he explained.
One of the quieter booths, literally, at the show represented High Strung Studios, which creates jewelry out of used and recycled guitar strings.
“I play guitar, so changing my guitar strings made me think of making jewelry,” said the business’ owner, Red Bank’s Jenny Woods. “I clean it up and make it beautiful. Most people who play guitar would like to wear it. It’s kind of cool and different.”
It was her second year at the show, spending last year promoting Musicians on a Mission, the nonprofit she co-founded in 2010.
But selling her own product, Woods said, was not the biggest draw for her at the Brookdale Guitar Show.
“I would be here even if I wasn’t selling jewelry. This is the place to be, right here,” she said.