Apple Hill’s Fred Leroux is being featured on a segment of Regional Contact which is slated to air April 15.
Following his retirement from farming, the now 75-year-old began to repair violins and make guitars.
His first guitar was carved with a broken piece of glass at the age of 14. His mother noticed his talent for musical instruments and purchased his very first violin a year or so later, and he’s been playing ever since.
Leroux has played for the Glengarry Old Tyme Fiddlers and is one of the first founders. Recently he created a new way of attaching the neck of a guitar to the base.
Leroux has created approximately a dozen guitars and has instructed others to make their own. All the ‘Leroux’ guitars have a special logo on the inside and a rose somewhere on the guitar. Rose, his wife, is very helpful and has a hand in every guitar made thus far. Leroux has no formal training on guitar making – he learned everything he knows by reading guitar making material and magazines and by plenty of trial and error.