One-year GAL member Birck Cox went to Reed College in Portland, Oregon in the 1970s. There he was friends with Ellen Black, who married lute maker Robert Lundberg. Birck acquired a graduate degree in medical illustration, and spent the next forty years drawing guts, not to put too fine point on it. But his attachment to lutherie is not simply journalistic. While a college student he learned to play the bagpipe, but later suffered some facial lacerations that made playing difficult. When he first heard the droning sound of a hurdy-gurdy, however, he was able to remember the pipe tunes as if played on a stringed instrument, and is slowly building up the knowledge and woodworking skills to build a hurdy-gurdy.

▪ bio current as of 2023