Ian Specimen mandolin

[Bigtuna]

Looking through an old Fretboard Journal and found an article about Ian Specimen and it got me looking on the web. Here is what I found. Anybody, have one or play one. Looks cool.

[mrmando]

His Web site gives the impression that this instrument is a one-off, but I don't know that for sure. I would love to try his stuff sometime.

[Cleveland Joel]

I had the great pleasure of visiting his shop in Chicago about 5 years ago and got to play it briefly through one of his custom made amps. It is a beauty to play and look at. It sounded a lot like an archtop jazz guitar, but still distinctly like a mandolin.

He was inspired to build it by listening to U. Srivnas. The body is unusually cylindrical, like a peanut in its shell. The string tension is lower than normal, so bending is very easy, but it still has that mandolin snap. One of the things I thought was interesting is that the pickup really caught the sound if you knocked on the pickguard or the body, so if the player was so inclined they could do interesting percussion things with it.

If my memory serves me right, he was looking for somewhere in the neighborhood of $3,500 for it. That seemed like a very fair price to me, but not something I am able to afford.

His horn speakers sound amazing. I also played his aluminum tenor, but it sounded kind of dead to me. His work is very interesting and eclectic. He's equal parts luthier and sculptor. Here's his website: http://www.specimenproducts.com/

[Ben Milne]

Specimen guitar gallery - youtube

Pick it up at around 3.36. - some pretty comprehensive info here.

also, Sopranocaster @ around 8.50