In tune with light

It’s fitting that a vinyl record spinning on a turntable in Matthew Hinton’s South Wilkes-Barre loft apartment is illuminated by the glow of a saxophone. A saxophone lamp, that is.

Hinton, 26, has been crafting light fixtures from old musical instruments for several years, after the initial inspiration of a stray clarinet. He was working part time at a record store in Greenville, S.C., and explains that his boss had quite the eclectic collection of things just lying around the shop.

“He had all sorts of weird stuff. I saw this clarinet sitting there, off to the side, and said to myself, ‘I can make that into a lamp. That looks like a pretty good lamp base.’ And I went with it from there,” he said.

Without a blueprint, just simply a vision, he headed to Home Depot right after work, clarinet in tow.

“I probably looked like an idiot standing there with a clarinet in my hand. A lot of people were looking at me funny,” he said. “I was in Home Depot for 45 minutes trying to figure out how to put it together so I didn’t have to drill holes in anything; I was very successful. It’s your average light-making equipment; it’s just turning it on its ear.”

“I’ve been working with electrical stuff my whole life. My dad worked at Radio Shack, and we rewired a whole house together, so I knew how to do that stuff. So, once I had the right structure, everything fell into place,” he said.

The finished clarinet lamp now lights up knickknacks and a collection of Norman Mailer books. An apartment filled with all those stacks of literature and crates of vinyl would clue anyone in on Hinton’s love of the arts. By day, Hinton teaches composition at Luzerne County Community College and is a research assistant on the Norman Mailer official biography. He’s also a playwright. His first full-length play, “The Quiet Cowboy,” had a staged reading last month at Paper Kite Press. It’s no doubt his background in theater – and all that prop and set building – contributed to his craftiness.

“I was always into theater as long as I can remember; I’ve always been a bit of a performer. But at King’s (College), I got a very rounded education in theater. You’re not just a cast member; you do everything. So I loved doing the carpentry and did some electrical work. Didn’t do so much of the lighting, but I would wire things for people. So yeah, that bit of creativity comes in there, too; there’s no doubt about that,” he said.

Hinton has crossed over from creating art through the written word and participating in the performing arts to creating functional art. That’s how he categorizes his creations.

“I haven’t done anything to alter the instruments themselves. … I could take that apart in a couple minutes,” he said, pointing to his saxophone lamp. “I can put the mouthpiece back on the saxophone, and it could play. Same thing with the clarinet.”

For example, he has a plan drawn up for a chandelier that would include three French horns as main lights, with piccolos and flutes hanging from them. He’s just waiting to find the instruments. On the other hand, he sometimes gets an instrument first. Right now, Hinton is planning what direction to go with a trumpet.

Once he has the instrument, a plan and the necessary hardware, Hinton says, the construction process takes just a few days.

“Once I get the piece, I am very anxious, very excited. I’m just like anyone; you want to see the end results. Every once in a while you run into a hiccup. That happened to me with the trumpet. The plungers on the trumpet, that’s a hard thing to get wire through, and you really can’t. So, I’m forced to work on other solutions. But I would say each one from start to finish might take me a couple days,” he said.

“Dream piece? I don’t know if I have a dream piece. Yet. I would love to get really, really big ones and really small ones to explore the whole gamut. My dream would be to get through the entire collection of the brass family,” he said.

“I really wouldn’t know what to do with a tuba yet,” he said with a laugh. “A trombone, though … a trombone torchette lamp is a dream. There are a lot of different ways to go with it.”

He’s also likely to make more saxophone lamps, each at varying heights, some table-height and others higher, like the one now in his living room.

“That one’s exceptionally high. I made that one that high so I could look at my records with it on. It’s got a really neat effect. I’ve got the turntable open and have that light on and watch the vinyl spinning,” he said.

“Mainly (from) people who don’t want them. They’re in a basement or in an attic. They haven’t been used in years; they won’t be used again,” he said, adding he’s mostly on the lookout for brass and woodwinds – instruments with a bell construction.

“All horns pretty much have that mouth bell coming out. That makes it really good because it throws the light and reflects really well. But someone gave me an electric guitar. I don’t know quite what to do with it yet,” he said.

Making lighting from musical instruments is still a hobby, but he’d like to sell or show the pieces one day.

“There’s the potential of putting them in a lot of different places, you know, music stores, or it would look neat in jazz clubs. Or for any music-lover at home,” Hinton said.

He has a history of making unusual household items. In South Carolina, he used an actual door as his kitchen table – he just attached legs. His present kitchen has an old metal shopping cart, suspended from his ceiling, which serves as a pot rack. He has a collection of old window panes in various shapes, sizes, colors and patterns, which he plans to piece together to make walls, a solution many small apartments use to create separate spaces.

“I like something that can be invented and reinvented over and over again,” he said. “I like to live in an aesthetically pleasing environment. I don’t think there is anything wrong with having a lot of artistic stuff around. You know, in the late, wee hours of the morning, that you can look at and contemplate, and even if it’s just something I take for granted, like a wall.”