Topic: The fotdella

[Johnm]

Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone knew for certain whether Jesse Fuller's fotdella survived him, and if it did, where it is currently housed.  I also wondered if anyone knew of anyone else who had constructed and used a fotdella.  Any information would be appreciated.
All best,
Johnm

[waxwing]

Not sure about the first question, Johnm, but if you search for "fotdella" at youtube you will find several recreated versions being played, including one by Andy Cohen:



Wax

[Johnm]

Thanks for posting that, John!  It's hard to believe that Jesse Fuller's fotdella had such a complicated set-up--for one thing, I don't think he had a full chromatic scale.  Chromatic scale or not, the clip illustrates the primary difficulty with the fotdella--getting the sucker to play in tune.
All best,
Johnm

[waxwing]

I didn't think Andy's was an exact replica, nor are any of the others on YT. There are also videos of Fuller playing his and in some you can see it pretty clearly and could make an educated guess as to his "scale". Here's San Francisco Bay Blues. It seems from this that Jesse would retune for different keys or chord structures.



It appears in the few that I looked at that, similarly to Andy, most use a scavenged piano mechanism, whereas Fuller seems to have used several drum pedal apparatus.

Wax