Some pics of my new Howe-Orme

[nmiller]

Every time I go out looking for a specific instrument, I end up with something completely different. Today, I went into a shop to check out a few of their electric guitars, and came out with a mandolinetto. From the analysis of H-O serials (http://bellsouthpwp.com/r/d/rdevelli/The%20Elias%20Howe%20Co.htm), I'm estimating that this one (S/N 642) was built ca. 1903. It was clearly a bottom-of-the-line mando, with mahogany back/sides and no binding anywhere. The good news is that the neck has been professionally reset and the bridge has been shimmed, so now it plays beautifully and sounds amazing. I've played cheaper Regal and Lyon & Healy-built mandolinettos, and they all sounded like cheap toys compared to this one. There's a surprising amount of volume and projection on tap, and while it doesn't have the bass of a great early Gibson, the low strings aren't anemic at all. It's in great condition, too - no cracks, separations or warping to be found. I love the original case, too - the hardware has beautifully Victorian styling.

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[Bill Snyder]

That is wonderful.

[billhay4]

Nice instrument. I'd like to hear it.
Bill

[brunello97]

Very nice. Rick Turner is our (non) resident Howe-Orme expert but unfortunately he doesn't come around often enough anymore. For the fun of it, I've attached a picture of his H-O. wall. Yikes.

I have an unlabeled mandolinetto with a headstock profile decidedly un-L+H, but certainly not H-O. Beautiful birdseye back but NO TOP. It is in my 'to do' folder. It did come with the same case as yours, same hardware etc. Very precious little box.

Yours looks in great shape. Enjoy it!

Mick

[Jake Wildwood]

No binding = attractive to me. :)

Nice purchase!

[Charles E.]

Sweet. Is a sound clip possible?

[Bob DeVellis]

Very nice mandolin. It's hard to find examples in good shape. Most eventually need a neck reset, so it's nice to find one that's already had the work done. Most people who haven't heard one of these mandolins would be surprised, I think, by the quality of their sound and by how loud they can be.

The year you suggest is a reasonable guess but any estimated guess is pretty much a stab in the dark. Over the six dozen or so instruments we've tracked, no clear, unambiguous correspondence between dates and number sequence has appeared.

Enjoy!

[robertr]

I recently picked up a similar one, in rosewood. Same fine EH Co pick guard. After a trip to our local luthier to lower the bridge a bit, it's a wonderful little instrument. currently my "go to" mando for noodling, around the house. I even took it to a local jam, where it's crisp high end, volume, and tone cut thru nicely. Tone to burn...

[nmiller]

Nice instrument. I'd like to hear it.
Bill


Sweet. Is a sound clip possible?

I'll try and record a sample in the next couple of days.


Very nice mandolin. It's hard to find examples in good shape. Most eventually need a neck reset, so it's nice to find one that's already had the work done. Most people who haven't heard one of these mandolins would be surprised, I think, by the quality of their sound and by how loud they can be.

The year you suggest is a reasonable guess but any estimated guess is pretty much a stab in the dark. Over the six dozen or so instruments we've tracked, no clear, unambiguous correspondence between dates and number sequence has appeared.

Enjoy!

I've only seen one other H-O in person, and it needed considerable work. I actually bought mine from the luthier who did the neck reset, and he said that the joint was inherently not very strong. We agreed that I should stick with light strings; it came with .10s, which sound and feel perfect. I was certainly surprised by the tone, and I think the rest of the shop was as well.

I know that the year is only a rough estimate. I figured that the serials were manufactured in order, but perhaps that's not a correct assumption. Oh well; narrowing it down to a decade is about as precise as you can get with a lot of defunct manufacturers.

[Jim Garber]

The other mandolinettos are basically flattop instruments shaped like ukes. H-Os are arched which I believe makes all the difference in tone etc.

[Bob DeVellis]

I agree with Jim. The domed top accommodates a lot more string tension and generates a lot more tone. Other guitar-shaped mandolins lack this advantage.

The neck joints are mortise and tenon and identical to those found on Vega instruments from the same period (the arch-backs, as opposed to the Howe-Orme "arch-fronts"). That joint definitely can come loose after prolonged exposure to heat, humidity, and string tension, and we're talking about instruments that go as far back as 1897 -- that's 115 years old.

nmiller, calling the instrument a 1903 Howe-Orme is perfectly reasonable. I'd personally probably say "around 1903" but I wasn't criticizing, just pointing out the inherent vagueness. No one knows at what rate these instruments were made, whether production in later years matched or exceeded that of earlier years, or anything else about their output, unfortunately.

I've always wondered why there isn't more of a following for these mandolins. Maybe it's their scarcity. After our article appeared in Fretboard Journal, I was hoping that they'd garner more attention. They were very innovative, cute as a button, and sound very good (although not like a Gibson, fi that's your frame of reference). Maybe it's just too difficult for players to ever find a chance to play one that's in decent shape to develop a taste for them.

[brunello97]

I remember some conversation about whether these tops were heat bent or whether they develop their profile from convex bracing (or some combination of the two.) Bob, did your research for the FJ article clarify things about the top forming process?

Mick

[Bob DeVellis]

All we can say with confidence is that they're not carved, although some replicas have been made with carved tops. I would assume that they're steamed and then put into a mold. If they were heated on a hot pipe, for example, there would be scorch marks (as there are on the inside of the cant of Vega cylinder-back mandolins). Also, I think the curvature on these is a bit trickier than bending sides (as an example) because the curve, although primarily lateral, also runs from neck to tail. It seems to me that building the tooling once would be the path to optimal consistency. Bracing certainly helps hold things where they should be but I strongly suspect that moist heat was part of getting the top into the required shape in the first place. Given the glues that were available, I wonder if each half of the top was curved before or after they were joined into a single bookmatched plate. I would think that the heat, moisture, and pressure involved in curving the top would put a lot of strain on the glue joint.

So, if I had to guess, I'd say halves were pressed to shape separately, then joined and braced, and then finally glued to the ribs. But that's all speculation, not documented fact.

[nmiller]

I decided that I should learn a piece that was suitable for a mandolin of this era, so I arranged a short classical tune for eight strings: the theme from Fawlty Towers. Then I decided to perform it on three different mandolins for comparison. They couldn't be further apart in construction or sound, but I recorded them all with the same microphone and setup. I used a small amount of EQ and compression (same for all three recordings) just to make it more listenable, but otherwise there are no effects added. Sorry for the playing - this is a world away from my usual style.

In order of appearance:

-1932 Gibson F-2 (carved spruce and maple, long scale)
-Mid '30s Slingerland Songster (bent solid spruce and maple, long scale)
-The Howe-Orme (bent solid spruce and flat mahogany, short scale)

The recording. (http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=11902002)

What you can't hear on the recording is that the Howe-Orme is the loudest of the three, despite having the smallest body.

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[morgan]

Congratulations on purchasing one of these little gems. I love their big, bright, forward sound, and they do have a surprisingly big bass sound, although less bass sustain. I've had several friends buy "other" brand mandolinettos after playing mine, but IMHO they have thinner sound quality and don't hold a candle to the Howe-Orme. I string mine with Dogal Calaces. In addition to the neck joint looking like a Vega (thanks for that tidbit!), I've been told by a luthier that the fretboard inlays on my somewhat more ornate model are the same as those on Vega banjos of the same period.
As an added bonus, the slightly shorter scale length gives you some relief if you develop any hand or wrist problems.

[robertr]

Here are a few pictures of my Howe-Orme. The tailpiece is not original, of course. It's in very good shape.9179891799918009180191802

[Bob DeVellis]

Robertr: What's the serial number on yours? I don't think I've seen this one before and I'd like to add it to my database.

[Bob DeVellis]

Turns out it is in the database: #H-140, which actually makes it a mandola (although Howe-Orme mandolas aren't much bigger than modern mandolins and this one is recorded as having a 14" scale).

[brunello97]

14" scale mandola, Bob? That's pretty short. (I was thinking my 15" Truax bowl-dola was short.) What gauge strings do folks use on those?

Mick

[robertr]

Bob -
Mandola? Should I be tuning it as such?
Is your database online, as I haven't found it yet. The serial number is too faded to read. The nut to bridge length is about 14 1/8".

[Bob DeVellis]

Something in the neighborhood of 14 7/8" is normal for these mandolas, while the mandolins run around 13 1/8". When this one with a 14" scale showed up, it puzzled folks, and it still does. I don't know if it was a custom, or it's been modified, or what.

I think the best thing to do is string it as a mandolin but be sure to use very light strings, like Calace, and keep an eye on things. My mandola, when I bought it, was strung (gauges and pitches) like a mandolin despite having a full 14 7/8" scale. Actually, the tension didn't turn out to be very different, as I recall, between mandolin and mandola strings when each was tuned to its respective pitch target. My mandola had already had a neck reset and the neck joint was rock-solid, so it had no trouble in either tuning. But I now have it strung with mandola strings tuned to mandola pitch. I don't think those strings would work very well on a 14" scale. They'd be too floppy. So mandolin tuning with light gauge strings and a careful eye on the neck angle is probably the way to go.

[nkforster]

All we can say with confidence is that they're not carved, although some replicas have been made with carved tops. I would assume that they're steamed and then put into a mold. If they were heated on a hot pipe, for example, there would be scorch marks (as there are on the inside of the cant of Vega cylinder-back mandolins). Also, I think the curvature on these is a bit trickier than bending sides (as an example) because the curve, although primarily lateral, also runs from neck to tail. It seems to me that building the tooling once would be the path to optimal consistency. Bracing certainly helps hold things where they should be but I strongly suspect that moist heat was part of getting the top into the required shape in the first place. Given the glues that were available, I wonder if each half of the top was curved before or after they were joined into a single bookmatched plate. I would think that the heat, moisture, and pressure involved in curving the top would put a lot of strain on the glue joint.

So, if I had to guess, I'd say halves were pressed to shape separately, then joined and braced, and then finally glued to the ribs. But that's all speculation, not documented fact.

I've made a few Howe orme style instruments, there are two basic design variations but the procedure for both is similar. My guess is the makers would usually go for the least complicated way to achieve the results, and that's what I've done:

For the fixed bridge instruments (guitars), the arch continues the whole length of the top, hence the ribs are cut to both accommodate and maintain the shape. The tops are taken thin enough to allow them to be pressed into a former without heat. The braces are fitted to the former.

For the floating bridge instruments (mandolinetto, mandocello etc) the ribs are left totally flat and a thin soundboard is pressed by clamping to shaped braces. No former needed. The braces closest to the bridge have the greatest arch, those further away, less, allowing the arch in the top to soften away by the time it reaches the ribs. Possibly not unlike how the Larson bros made their rather crude archtop guitars. When I've done this with a thin soundboard surprisingly little pressure was needed to make the tops conform and fit to the ribs.

There is no way to know for sure this is how the originals were made but it certainly works and does not need much in the way of tooling. Some makers like to complicate things but most don't. And these are ladder braced instruments, very high quality ones but ladder braced none the less. They were certainly made VERY well, but my guess is they were made quickly by folk who knew what they were doing.

I've recently just sent one off to a customer with out photographing it - I've asked him to take a few and if he does I'll let you all see.

nigel
http://www.nkforsterguitars.com/

[billhay4]

Thanks for the sound clip. Nice, bright instrument.
Bill