Choro mandolin from brazil

[BlueMountain]

I spotted this on eBay http://cgi.ebay.com/ws....US:1123 and wrote to the seller for more info. Here's his reply:

"Hello! Yes, I finished this mandolin in the last may. I`m engineer and the luthiery is only a hobby, so I`m not a full-time luthier. My name is David Gomes. I don`t have web site but you can listen to this mandolin at youtube. Look for the video "Choro Trocadilhando (Jorge Cardoso)" and you`ll can characterize its quality. This is still my sixth mandolin, but many mandolin players from here have liked them. As you know our brazilian mandolin are very different from yours. They have a different tone, but you`ll problably like it. I knew Dudu Maia last month! He`s really a very good player! I`m waiting your offer! You won`t regret! Thanks! David Gomes Almeida - Ceará - Brazil"

Here's the YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suRTXDLoi8Y
Sounds pretty impressive to me. He hasn't sold on eBay before, but seems to know what he's talking about and deserves to be encouraged.

[DavidLuthier]

Thanks for your congratulations to my mandolin, BlueMontain!

David Gomes Almeida - Fortaleza/Ceará/Brazil
davidsh@ibest.com.br

[DavidLuthier]

Who want can write me an e-mail and I send back that music "Trocadilhando" in a encore file.
davidsh@ibest.com.br

[Mandobar]

he bailed on the auction. must have sold it off line.............i hate when people do this. put up a buy it now!!!!!!!!!

[Jim Garber]

It sounds like he may have accepted an offer tho I think eBay has a mechanism for properly doing so. Bluemountain, did you buy it?

[DavidLuthier]

Sorry, friends! I couldn`t sell my mandolin so cheap and ebay did`t accept to include a deserve price...
It happenned, because I don`t speak english very well and it was my first list at ebay.com.

Sorry!
I wanna sell by $500.00 or R$ 800,00.

[BlueMountain]

I had the top bid on it, but no, I didn't buy it privately. I don't buy that way. However, I've just e-mailed David and offered to buy it at his price. It looks and sounds very nice.

[Jim Garber]

Ed:
Let us know how it goes and a review of the instrument when you get it.

[BlueMountain]

The bandolim arrived a couple days ago (same day as a used Collings MT-2V which I'm afraid has blown it out of the water, but that can't be helped).

The bandolim is not as perfectly made as the Collings--not much is--but it is a very nicely done hand-made instrument. The spruce top is very thin, rather like a Sobell, but the o-hole has an extra layer glued on at right angles inside to help avoid splitting. The top is sort of X-braced in an interesting way. As the top is flat, the braces are of course much bigger than the tone bars in a carved-top mandolin. I was interested, looking inside with light and mirrors, to see that where the braces cross each other, David had glued and screwed and extra little strip at the top for strength (he's a professional engineer, and I assume he knows what he's doing).

The sides are walnut. The back is a beautiful curly walnut. The binding is several-layered wood. The neck is something a bit mahogany-like, laminated, but I'm not sure what. The headstock has what looks like a spruce veneer on it, so it's light. Unusual. The fretboard is radiused, and I think it's jacaranda, which looks a lot like ebony. Bone nut and bridge.

David played it enough before selling it that there was quite a bit of fret wear on the fat frets, so I dressed the frets. They'd been beveled on the edge, but were still sharp, so I took care of that, too. The set-up was already very good: 4/64ths inch at the 12th fret.

This is the only bandolim I've ever played, though I've heard a number of them played professionally, and I don't play choro at all. I just love the tone. The tone is lovely: open, resonant, sweet, warm, more like Dudu Maia's bandolim than Danilo Brito's. It's quiet with light playing, but puts out a lot of volume if one digs in a little.

I think the scale is around 13 1/2", estimating. It's about three inches shorter than the Collings, but much wider, as bandolims are. It comes in a special hard bandolim case with lots of room for supplies and a bandolim in bas relief on the top. It also comes with a set of bandolim strings from Brazil. Before I changed strings, I measured them: .034, .023, .014, .010. That is to say, the same size as D'Addario J62s, and that's what I put on. They work just fine.

I'd say that this would be a wonderful mandolin not only for choro but for celtic. It takes some courage to buy a mandolin from a Brazilian seller with no feedback rating on eBay, but David is the real thing. He made this himself, and it's a very nice bandolim.

I'm probably going to put it up for sale, soon, as the opportunity for this Collings came unexpectedly, and I'm now money short again. If you're interested, contact me now and save me the trouble of photos and writing an ad and you can save yourself some money.

[DavidLuthier]

BlueMountain,
Thanks for your words!

I wanna correct you "neck is something a bit mahogany-like, laminated, but I'm not sure what."
It isn`t laminated is cedar (cedro in Brazil) and that piece in the middle in "sucupira", that is stronger than manilkara or ebony. The fretboard is really in rosewood, but is very dark like ebony.

Thanks!

David Gomes

[Brad Weiss]

Happy to hear the positive review, Ed! Yes, it takes some courage to buy from Brazil sight unseen... Well done David!