Thanks, folks.
All the cutting and piecing was done with a router and templates. Two different approaches for the maple and for the laminated band.
I got the idea for the maple from this YouTube video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rerY3nLhgv4. If you think of each cut as consisting of an 'A' piece and a 'B' piece, then you need a template for each piece... since the router bit is non-zero width, one template follows the line you want to cut, and the matching template is offset by the diameter of the router bit you plan to use. In the video he goes into plenty of detail to help understand. Once you have the templates, the sequence is a) route the first 'A' line (say, in the cherry), b) route the first 'B' line in the maple, c) glue those together. Now your blank transitions from cherry to maple. Repeat a-c to make the transition back to cherry. Of course, with a little thought you can get the grain in the cherry to match across the inlaid maple.
The compound strip was actually much easier. In this case, I used one of my templates (it doesn't matter which) to route a 1/2" slot in a piece of MDF. Next, with a 1/2" router bushing and a 1/4" bit, I routed a trough across the workpiece. Now to the bandsaw, and cut down the middle of that trough (carefully!) to separate the two halves. Then, with a pattern bit in the router, clean up the ragged edge left by the bandsaw. Replace the missing material with a strip of equal width, and Bob's your uncle. Of course, if you have a 1/4" bit long enough, you don't need to deal with the bandsaw and second pass, but then you have to take care that the two halves of your workpiece don't move in relation to each other as you make your cut. Here's a YouTube video that gave me the idea, although my implementation of it is a bit different:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOh9R04xxSw.
The nice thing about using the bushing method, is the same template can be used to make multiple widths of inlay by varying the bit that you use. Having done one of these, I plan to make an uber-template with several shapes of curved (and straight) bushing slots. Since this method relies on a one-piece template, I can get a lot of flexibility by putting multiple slots in the same piece of MDF, and then pick which ones I want for a given board.
Oh, I should also mention that all these machining steps were done on an oversize blank. That way, I could pick my preferred framing of the inlay after it was complete... same way you'd lay out pieces of wood in a board to take the best advantage of grain patterns.
