Bob Kogut

Bob Kogut recently finished making fiddle number 291. “I am trying to think of a name for her,” he says. “It’s a quirky thing I do, where I have to name each fiddle I make.” The naming started with the seventh or eighth fiddle he made. “I sold it to a lady in Orlando. She called and said she loved it. “It’s a bella,” she said. “I’m going to call her Bella.” From that point on, Bob has been christening all his fiddles with a name ending in the letter A. At nearly 300 fiddles in, it gets harder to find new names.

It makes sense to Bob, who says the old grand steamships- hand-built and riveted- were christened with a name. “The workers were proud of them and named them a woman’s name that ended in the letter A.”

A native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Bob’s early exposure to music was doo-wop bands on street corners, singing in four-part harmony. When he graduated from high school in 1967, Bob wanted to attend college, mainly to avoid going to Vietnam. “I didn’t get accepted into college, but I did get a letter from the government telling me to report for my physical.”

Bob passed his physical, and he was drafted into the Marines. But before he could report for duty, he was hit by a drunk driver. “It was the worst and best thing that happened to me,” he says. A head injury left him with a hand tremor. “My doctor told my parents to go to a pawn shop and get me a guitar. He said that would help with the tremors." While he recovered, Bob laid on his back and taught himself how to play the guitar.

When he got off his crutches, Bob joined a rock band. “We played at the waterfront bars around Philly.”  Bob never thought he would like bluegrass music. “But I got hooked,” he laughs. It happened when his brother invited Bob to join him on a trip to Sunset Park for a bluegrass festival. Bob was skeptical. “Then Bill Monroe and His Blue Grass Boys stepped on stage with their matching suits and brimmed hats, and I heard Kenny Baker. He was just dripping with emotion and played beautifully.”  After the concert, Bob and his brother wandered around the camping area, where Bob observed mini jam sessions all over the grounds. “I asked my brother, ‘Where are the amps? Where is their sheet music?’”

When he returned home, Bob purchased a student violin from a local music store. He learned to play, and over the years, he traded and changed fiddles, looking for the perfect-sounding instrument. He moved to Orlando, Florida, where he met violin expert Bob Bragg. Bragg sent Bob home with different fiddles to try, and he even taught Bob how to do some of the setup and small repair jobs. That led to bigger jobs, and soon Bob was working on fixing up old fiddles. Bragg encouraged Bob to make a fiddle. “He said I was already doing repair jobs that required the same skills as making an instrument.”

Before he became a serious fiddle maker, Bob worked as a physical therapist. “I worked in an assisted living facility, and I would take my fiddle in on Fridays and stroll through the dining hall. People loved it.” Making fiddles is his passion, and Bob can’t imagine doing anything else. He moved to Western North Carolina in 1999 and set up his workshop in the basement of his home. “I love to have people visit when I’m working in the shop,” he says. “I have a corner where people jam. I never listen to recorded music when I’m working.”

His attention to detail may have come from his early desire to be a car mechanic. As an Eagle Scout, Bob took up whittling. Now, he does elaborate carvings on the back plates of his fiddles. “I don’t do commission work,” he says. “I do what I want, and when it’s finished, it’s finished.” His fiddles are now owned by fiddlers across the United States and many countries worldwide. Bob keeps track of his instruments and their players.

He moved to western North Carolina in 1999 after playing several gigs at Merlefest. “I fell in love with the area.” He has played fiddle with local bands, including The Neighbors and The Kruger Brothers. “I have a contradance band, and the Krugers love to join us when they are home. They call themselves the Wurst Brothers, saying they are the “best of the wurst.” Bob says he uses those performances to test out his newest fiddles. “Fiddle tunes were designed for dancing,” Bob explains. “The structure matches the dances.”

In addition to making fiddles and playing music, Bob teaches violin setup and repair classes, demonstrations, and workshops. He is passionate about young musicians and does violin adjustments and setups for the Junior Appalachian Musicians (JAM). “It’s an arts council-funded program for kids to learn to play instruments to preserve old-timey and bluegrass music. It’s a program that is well-supported by the community here.”

Bob actively supports music and is now a sponsor of MerleFest. He donates one of his violins each year to be auctioned off. He is a board member of the Blue Ridge Artisan Center, where he serves on the standards committee. Bob’s work as a luthier was recognized with his induction into the Blue Ridge Music Hall of Fame in June 2021. As a musician, he is accomplished in bluegrass, old-time, jazz, swing, and Italian folk music, and he not only plays the fiddle but the mandolin, bass, banjo, and guitar.