The Galvatone Story
In April of 2004, while attending the Old Settlers Music Festival, I had the pleasure of seeing the Kansas based band “Split Lip Rayfield”. The bass player, Mr. Jeff Eaton was playing a single string upright bass made from an old gas tank. This immediately fueled thoughts of building my own funky, novelty bass instrument.

Once I returned home, I found the web site of Dennis Havlena of Cheboygan, Michigan. Dennis is builder of all sorts of homemade musical instruments. He had seen variations of the bass in the past so I’m not real sure who was the first on the planet to build such a beast. Detailed on Dennis’s web site were the plans to build your own four string wash tub bass. After finding “the perfect tub”, I went to work on my first bass. It required plenty of sawing, drilling, sanding, and shaping the rock hard maple with a block plane. When the strings were tightened, I was amazed at the unique acoustic properties of the #3 galvanized wash tub. I now had an instrument that had enough acoustic volume to keep up with guitars, banjos, and fiddles. The instrument is also durable enough to survive the rough and dirty conditions of bluegrass festival camping.

A few weeks later, I built an electronic pick-up system to use the bass with my group, Anderson, Flesher, & Key. Woody Key is credited for the name, “The Galvatone”. I now build these instruments one at a time and ship them from the Galvatone World Headquarters in Amarillo, Texas. World Headquarters also doubles as my garage.

For more information on owning your own Galvatone, please contact
Bob Flesher at:
806-358-3214 or click here to email Bob
Keep on pickin’ and pluckin’

Bob Flesher

Galvatone News

April 17, 2007 - Texas Country Reporter comes to Amarillo for an exclusive intrerview and video taping with Bob Flesher and The Galvatone. "The Galvatone" will air Memorial Day Weekend. Check your local listing for air times.

July 14, 2006 - "Not Your Grandma's Washtub", a story on The Galvatone is published in the Amarillo Globe News. Click here to read the story or here for the video.

Galvatone Video Clips (click logos below for video clips)