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Campanella Strings A-Style Mandolin
I have recently taken the plunge and bought a handmade instrument. It is a Campanella Strings mandolin, made by Joe Cleary. Joe has an interesting approach to making mandolins. In the early 1900s, Orville Gibson revolutionized mandolin design by borrowing the idea of a carved top and back from the violin. In 1922, Lloyd Loar of the Gibson Company borrowed the violin's "f" holes as well. After more than eighty years, Joseph Campanella Cleary, of Campanella Strings, wondered if the mandolin had still more to gain from the violin. Joe Cleary's mandolins are still based on the style of the early Gibson mandolins, but (as he puts it on his website) he "updates the mandolin of the early 1920s with cutting edge 17th and 18th century designs and workbench techniques." I had heard about Joe and was interested in learning more about his mandolins, but it wasn't until I played the mandolin he made for Dick Staber (of Staber and Chasnoff and formerly the mandolin player with Del McCoury as well as with Don Stover) that I became really interested in his work. Dick Staber's mandolin is one of the finest mandolins I have ever played. That was an "F" style however, and my lifestyle and income have made me more used to the "A" style mandolins. A little later I played the "A" mandolin Joe had made for Caleb Elder, and I was convinced Joe has the magic touch. I visited Joe's shop a few times while my mandolin was being built. He is always very interesting to talk to about all aspects of instrument making. One thing he mentioned in our conversations is his consideration of the acoustic properties of all the materials he uses in his mandolins. For instance, he doesn't use kerfing. Kerfing is strips of wood with many little cuts (kerfs) in it. The cuts allow the wood to bend easily. It is commonly used to join the top and back to the sides of an instrument. Joe prefers to use thin, bent wood linings, as in violins. He doesn't use the common edging found on many mandolins, the plastic "ivoroid" binding. The plastic binding offers no acoustic advantages to the instrument. It is there only to protect the edge of the instrument. He makes a wooden edge, similar to a violin. The edge has an inlay of perfling, three very narrow strips of wood (usually willow or holly). Because the grain of the perfling is not running in the same direction as the top or back, it keeps it from cracking if the edge is hit. It gives a very pretty look, but also protects the instrument.
Detail of the slot waiting for the perfling inlay to be inset. Joe builds the mandolins by hand, using traditional tools and techniques. These techniques include using gouges, planes, and scrapers. Joe doesn't use sandpaper to smooth the instrument. He has a number of different scrapers with razor-sharp edges (some using the burr on the edge of the metal) to smooth the wood. One of the differences of this technique is that the grain of the wood is more readily apparent. He also finishes the mandolins with oil varnish he has made himself. Making varnish is an unusual skill all its own. One of the times I was at his shop he showed me how he was using different metals (zinc and iron among others) to produce different colors for his varnish. The end product is an instrument that is light and has wonderful tone, as well as great volume and sustain. In 2005, Joe received a grant from the Vermont Arts Council to pursue his concept of making mandolins with traditional violin-making techniques. He documented the process of creating an "F" style mandolin in a blog available from his website (click on "Notes" on his site or click here). At the end of the process, the mandolin was presented in a concert of solo mandolin music played by Jamie Masefield of The Jazz Mandolin Project. For more information about Joseph Campanella Cleary, you can visit his website, Campanella Strings There is also a lengthy article about Joe in the Fall 2005 edition of the William and Mary Alumni Magazine. The article is available online at http://www.wm.edu/alumni/WMAA/Magazine/Fall05/JustoffDog.pdf with the last page of the article at http://www.wm.edu/alumni/WMAA/Magazine/Fall05/runoff.pdf. Here are pictures showing different stages in the creation of the mandolin Joe made for me. Part of the block of wood next to the ribs in the first two pictures was made into the beautiful maple back from the other pictures. All these photographs (and the preceding ones) were taken by Joe Cleary. Click on a picture to see a more detailed image.
Notice in the picture below, the marks left by the arching gouge. Later Joe used scrapers to make the top smooth.
The following pictures are of the mandolin finished "in the white," before Joe sized (sealed) the top with thinned hide glue and stain before the first varnish coat. One of the photos is a detail of Joe's characteristic edge on his mandolins.
These next two photos are from the end of the varnish stage. Joe built up the color from an initial coat of yellow oil varnish, through a red brown spirit varnish, to a deeper violin red that shades the darker portions of the sunburst. He hasn't sent me any photos yet of the in between phases of the varnishing, when the colors of the varnish don't represent the final color of the instrument. He calls that the "ugly duckling" stage. Still remaining to be done is a final (French) polishing and then the frets, bridge, nut, tailpiece, tuners and any final adjustments.
Here are some pictures of the finished mandolin. These are all photos taken by me. The first one is of Joe playing the mandolin the day I picked it up at his shop. I love the sound of this instrument. I'll have to post some mp3 files of it soon. Caleb Elder (who has one of these) told me his mandolin started out sounding great, and just improves as time passes. I'm looking forward to playing this for many, many years. Click on any photo on this page to see a more detailed image.
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