A cigar box guitar is typically an empty cigar box repurposed as a resonator used to build a simple and often primitive guitar. Early ones had one or two strings, today they typically have three or four strings. But the fun part about them is there are no rules!
The first known cigar box guitars came about here in the USA somewhere in the mid 1800’s. Their inventors where Americans living in poverty who could not afford a real instrument so they created their own.
Interest in cigar box guitars has recently blossomed
Seems people are attracted to them for a variety of reasons. Some use them simply as art. Others are attracted to them as a substitute for a 6 string guitar due to either their simplicity to learn and play, and or because they are typically less expensive than manufactured instruments, particularly if you build your own!
Birth of the blues
Cigar box guitars were an important catalyst and what I would call a fermenter in the rise of jug bands as well as blues music. During the Great Depression of the 30’s there was a resurgence of primitive instruments including cigar box guitars. This music came about as Americans experiencing hard times would sing away the blues. Industrious but poor folks in the American south, mostly black musicians, are credited for using perhaps just a broom handle or simple board and some bailing wire to make their own instruments.
The modern revolution
Today there is a “Cigar Box Revolution” occurring not only here in the USA, but in many other parts of the world as well. This revival is in some ways credited to the growing interest in DIY culture. For more information about this modern revival you can check out this 2008 film titled “Songs Inside the Box”, filmed at the Cigar Box Guitar Extravaganza, held in Huntsville, Alabama, also home of the annual Cigar Box Guitar Festival.