Jim Kozel – Luthier, Musician

A 1934 Martin OOO-18 came into my shop for repair and restoration.  After several crack repairs and some serious bar fret work, it’s singing again.  It doesn’t quite need a neck reset.

This 60 year old DiMauro gypsy jazz guitar came into the shop with a previous headstock repair.  It had failed.  This challenging repair required lot’s of planning.  Here’s the long repair process condensed into a 7 minute video.

As a Cleveland area luthier, it’s a joy to return a repaired or restored instrument to its owner. Sometimes I get lucky and the shop gets filled with music for a bit. That’s exactly what happend when Toni Huff Medley

Brent Kirby’s beloved J-45 was due for some repair TLC… complete refret, fractured bridge repar and a loose fractured back brace in a bad location. Here’s how we got after that broken back brace.

Beard cones and spiders are considered a high end upgrade for most dobros. Here’s how we did the Beard cone and spider upgrade on Josh Stevens‘s dobro. The first part of the video talks about the difference between dobros and

As a Cleveland area luthier, it’s always a pleasure to hear some of the finest local professionals play their instruments after I’ve done a repair or setup for them.  I spend time with every customer when they bring me an

The seasonal changes in the Great Lakes region, including the Cleveland area and northeast Ohio, keep my life as a luthier and guitar repair person busy with frequent adjustments to optimize guitar setup.  Here’s a video on how truss rod

When local Cleveland area musician, Tony Koussa, brought a recent 2011 Martin OM online purchase into the shop it was clear it had issues.  The neck heel had pulled away from the body.  The action was so high the guitar

There are many talented performers in the Cleveland and Northeast Ohio area.  Jody Getz is one of them.  Her guitar came into the shop with pickup issues and a mystery intermittent buzz.  Here’s what we did to fix the issues,