Cello building.

[Pete Jenner]

Here's some great cello action.

[Bertram Henze]

I was waiting through half the video for a revelation of the big secret: how do you remove that double core frame from the sides glued around it? And they just skipped it!

[Bernie Daniel]

What a great video! Sharp tools. Amazing the difference in carving maple and spruce.

[sunburst]

Beautifully filmed. Kind of makes me want to be a luthier. How satisfying it must be...

[Bernie Daniel]

Beautifully filmed. Kind of makes me want to be a luthier. How satisfying it must be...

Best video in a while...

I thought the mixing of the varnish was just amazing -- and so why do they use a pallet knife to apply it?

Also he seemed rather casual in his use of hot hide glue? Seem not to be too hurried to get his clamps in place?

I'm going to watch it again but speed though the interview parts - but I would like to have understood the cellist's comments.

[sunburst]

...I would like to have understood the cellist's comments.

I would like to have heard the cellist play instead of the overdubbed sound track just continuing through. Funny how the fingers matched up with the notes we heard part of the time.

[Bernie Daniel]

I would like to have heard the cellist play instead of the overdubbed sound track just continuing through. Funny how the fingers matched up with the notes we heard part of the time.

Yes that was weird. At one point I thought that they had spliced two sound tracks and that he WAS playing. So did he like the cello or not?

[Robbie Hamlett]

Really cool! I watched it the second time with the sound turned off and just read the subtitles. It actually made more sense that way! I do wonder why they didn't subtitle the cellist's comments as well though.

[Bernie Daniel]

There is so much in this video -- other things:
Interesting that he uses a hand joiner plane to get the two back pieces ready to join but then uses a band saw to actually cut out the back. When I saw the joiner plane I was thinking maybe the philosophy was to do everything in the "ancient ways".

When he is carving out the back I could not see any reference points? Like holes or something to guide him?

If anyone in the world should use a duplicator or SOMETHING to hog out the big stuff on the backs and sides it is a cello maker!

The comment about luthiers losing "creativity" because they are obsessed with copying the masters is a thought provoking comment too. The idea was further develop by the latter comment that these bowed instrument, by decree or conventional wisdom, reached their "maturity" hundreds of years ago (e.g., the Italian masters) and so they have not "advanced" the only goal is to make a better (the best) copy?

Same is true for the F-5 everyone is trying to make a better copy of (most faithful) the Loar-signed Gibson mandolins? Yet it is possible that some of the fine makers like Gilchrist (and many others) may have already move the standards beyond that and we should be copying them instead? Don't answer that!

In that sense are the musicians who use the cello also copying as they attempt to play classical music exactly as it was intended?

[JEStanek]

OK. I missed the video you all were talking about at first (the top half of the linked page had an orange box over it) and watched the Mr. Rogers one at the bottom. Sooo, I didn't get any of your comments until later!

Jamie

[Ivan Kelsall]

Many thanks for that Peter - I've been hoping for the mandolin version of that film for years,
Ivan

[John Kelly]

What a great video. I was lucky enough to attend the excellent Stringed Instruments course at Anniesland College in Glasgow when I retired from teaching English in 2003/4 and one of the tutors was (and still is) the fine luthier William Kelday. Bill has been making cellos for the past few years as well at his premises in Fintry here in Scotland and here is a link to his website. He's an inspiring builder.

http://www.keldaycello.com/about.html

[Bertram Henze]

Still nobody can resolve the mystery described in post#2? Or is this just one of the secrets builders always keep to themselves?

[Eric Oliver]

I think the frame is removed with a hammer.
The blocks, the head, tail and corner blocks, are knocked free prior to gluing to the plates to the ribs.
He scribed two lines on the perimeter of the plates while the ribs were in the frame. One to cut the rough perimeter, and one to see where to set the rib to the plate for gluing.
Watch how little glue is used to affix the blocks to the frame. And consider that the gluing surface is "end-grain plywood."
You can imagine how flexible the rib structure is once it is free from the frame if you have flexed and handled your mandolin rib structure out of the molds and not yet glued to a plate. The frame is knocked off the blocks and the rib structure is free enough to wiggle out the frame.
I think this is the typical way violin family builders do it.

[Bertram Henze]

I think the frame is removed with a hammer.

That would explain why they didn't show it in the video - too much brutality for an otherwise "hypnotic" experience.

[sunburst]

...too much brutality for an otherwise "hypnotic" experience.

Yes, photographers and videographers tend to be rather selective in which parts of the process they reveal to the public (a statement that some may recognize as being roughly the same thing I said in post #4).

[Eric Oliver]

I don't mean for you to infer any real brutality in knocking off the blocks from the frame. (If you did.)

Imagine the builder with a small cabinet hammer tapping the sides of the blocks until the glue joint fails. I would also suspect he had his free hand backing the outside of the rib and blocks to keep the rib for moving too much. Remember the blocks were glued to the frame with this removal in mind.

[sunburst]

...Imagine the builder with a small cabinet hammer tapping the sides of the blocks until the glue joint fails...

Yes, but imagine even that much "brutality" interspersed with all the romantically lit, graceful drawing and carving that the video displays.
That is basically how it is done; the weak glue joints holding the corner blocks are sheered to release in inside form, but only you, Bertram, want to see that operation in a video like this.

[Bertram Henze]

but only you, Bertram, want to see that operation in a video like this.

Yeah, give me some hard rock luthiery

[Bernie Daniel]

Yeah, give me some hard rock luthiery

Well they could use your hard rock services in Custer County South Dakota -- they have a long way to go on the Crazy Horse Memorial there!

[Bertram Henze]

Crazy Horse Memorial there!

With all those people on his nose, the mighty chief looks like he feels a sneeze coming, rocking the rocks really hard...