By Doron Markowitz

Derek Duncan
Seymour Duncan pickup company

Doron: Hello Derek, and thank you very much for taking the time to sit with me to talk about the art of pickup making. I appreciate your time. Tell me a little bit about how you got started winding and building pickups. Derek: Well I’ve been working around them since I was a kid really. I’m 28 now, and have probably been working here for pretty much the last 18 years, lol. I used to work here during the summer doing odd jobs when I was really young (tinning wires, grinding magnets, filing magazines, and a host of other random activities that a young kid could do). When I got into highschool I would ride my bike to work after school some days and help out in the custom shop. My dad(Seymour) and MJ(Maricela Juarez) would show me all the little details of pickups building, and most importantly WHY something was built a certain way. They are both into vintage pickups, so I would spend a lot of time helping build the antiquity pickups.

Doron: Did you do any other type of electronics work before beginning to wind pickups?

Derek: I was always tinkering with stuff at home too. I would setup home stereos for my parents as a way to make a little money when I was young. I have also been riding dirtbikes since I was 6, so I have always had to work on them myself. Diagnosing some issue on a bike can actually teach you a lot. It teaches you to start to rule things out, you can go through parts one at a time until you find what isn’t working properly (especially with the electrical system). It is that way too when diagnosing something wrong with a guitar. You can narrow it down in a few steps and see where the issue is coming from. Our customer service guys are good at this too. I think people often assume after an install and something isn’t working right that the pickup is bad…”it worked before I changed pickups and now it doesn’t, and I followed the instructions EXACTLY” After a few questions, it usually turns out that a ground wire was missing, or a wire was soldered in the wrong place. Back to the electronics topic…I think I’ve had a good understanding about how things work, I was always taking apart old VCR’s and radios and stuff to see how they worked. I seem to be the go to person when any of my friends have something electronic that breaks. Pickups are pretty complex, so working on a motorcycle stator or installing an amp in a friend’s car are pretty simple.

Doron: What was it that made you decide to devote your life to crafting pickups? Derek: First off, it’s a family business(my Mom and Dad are the only two owners) so it was kind of a natural fit. Plus I am very hands on and enjoy the dynamics here. We have a ton of great people here, many of us hang out together on the weekends and whatnot. Working in the custom shop had been great in that I can work on such a wide variety of requests. I enjoy building something that makes a customer happy, and I always like to find new ways to make something happen. There is also a great deal of logistics that I enjoy too. It can be busy at times, but I like the fast pace. I am not one to really ever “relax” on my time off. I’m always doing something. Oh, and maybe the best part of all is the chance to see so many great artists and hang out and talk gear. In the past few months, we’ve gone and seen some huge bands and longtime Duncan users like Iron Maiden, to smaller bands of a mellower genre like Santa Barbara’s Iration. It’s always fun to go check out a show and see the diverse music made using our products.

Doron: Did you find that the guitars on the market lacked something that you thought you could improve upon, which made you decide to become a pickup maker?

Derek: I think there are a ton of great products out there. I like to give someone the sound they are looking for in an instrument that may not be setup to sound that way. i.e. a SSS strat to sound like it has beefy humbuckers in it, or a HH setup to sound like a strat for example. Or tweaking a sound just a bit(i.e. a little more bottom end) or giving something a custom look(burt finish on some humbuckers, or a strat pickup with wood bobbins), or basically anything out of the ordinary. We are a pretty large manufacturer of pickups, but we also handle custom builds and rewinds like the smallest of boutiques. We repair pickups from 1937 lap steels, to one off active 8 string guitar pickups and everything in between.

Doron: How long have you been winding pickups?

Derek: Hmmm, I’d say 16 years would be a good number.

Doron: What do you look for, tonally when you wind different types of pickups?

Derek: Well we usually start with what the customer wants. If they have something in mind, we will try and match what they are looking for. We will get all the specs of the guitars wood, weight, string gauge, pot value, musical tastes, etc and account for those variables. A pickup that sounds completely awesome in you strat style guitar may not sound the same in your LP guitar. I think people need to keep that in mind when they choose a certain magnet type for example.

Doron: Where do you draw inspiration from for some of your builds? Derek: I like to see the finished product, from cad drawing, to part fabrication, to the end product. There are many steps involved in a custom build, so getting everything together in a finished product is exciting to me. I also like to hear the music as the end result, of course. Hearing some djent from a custom 7 string active is great, as is some raw blues with some Antiquity humbuckers.

Doron: What is your philosophy in regards to pickup crafting?

Derek: Build it vintage when you have to and modern when you have to. We have some wire from the 30’s that we use if it has to be period correct, where on the other end of the spectrum, we have made pickups with silver wire, and custom active circuitry. We don’t want to be pinned into a certain category.

Doron: Do you do custom pickups for specific clients or focus more on existing company models?

Derek: Working in the custom shop, we build more client specific models, although we do have a few popular models that customers rave about like the 78 model and BG1400.

Doron: How long does it typically take you to build a custom pickup for an average client?

Derek: Lead time and actual build time can vary quite a bit. We always like to go as detailed as we can. We had to make some custom parts once to replicate a pickup from the 50’s and ended up having to have a plastic company custom make us a layered sheet of plastic. We could have just used a standard black white black pickguard blank, but instead, we went the extra distance and had the material custom made, since no one has made it in years. A simple humbucker may take a couple hours, where a complete replica of a 70 year old pickup can take a few days of design time, custom machining time, and building. We offer these services because that’s how we started back way before I was born, helping customers repair the pickup in their favorite guitar(no matter what kind) or turning an average guitar into a great guitar.

Doron: What are some of your favorite magnets, coils, etc, to work with, for your own “ideal” pickup?

Derek: That’s tough to say and depends heavily on the music style and sound im going for. I’d prefer a lower output wind and some alnico 2, 3,4, or 5 magnets for vintage tone, and a high output wind and ceramic for more modern metal.

Doron: Have you ever encountered a project that seemed too much of a challenge for you to take on?

Derek: Some custom active pickups can get expensive very fast. We also get requests for gold parts once in a while. That would be so expensive that it’s not something we would want to try without knowing for sure how awesome it would turn out, lol. 13 string tele? Bring it on!

Doron: For anyone out there, thinking of a career in lutherie, what kind of advice would you give them?

Derek: If you want to build something a certain way, do it, and don’t mind what others think. As long as you or your customer like it, that’s all that matters. Just like music itself.

Doron: How can someone order a custom pickup from you?

Derek: You can shoot us an email at customshop@seymourduncan.com or call us here in Santa Barbara at 805-964-9610 x1009. Odds are that you will get a reply from MJ our 30+ year veteran here. She has undoubtedly wound more pickups heard on more famous recordings than perhaps anyone in history, no joke.

Doron: Thank you so much for taking the time out to talk with me today, Derek. I greatly appreciate it. Before we go, is there anything else you would like to share with our readers?

Derek: This may be the first interview I’ve done so go easy on me, lol. Thanks taking the time to hear what I have to say. Please get in touch with me or us if you have any requests for the custom shop, or want to run an idea by us. Rock on!

Thanks again