Loar Signed Instruments and their Proper Place


By: Daniel Date: Oct 29, 2006 - 11:49 AM

As I sit here in my LoarFestWest '06 t-shirt, I wonder if we risk overstating the quality of the Loar signed instruments produced by Gibson in the mid-20s.

To be sure, their impact on the American mandolin market has been as profound as the creation of the dreadnought has been on the guitar market. With the added benefit -as opposed to the dreadnought- that the design was documented, credited, and had elements patented, making it easier for later generations (us) to view the F5 in proper context. Loar F5s are very important instruments for people interested in the development of the mandolin in American music (again, us).

However, our fixation on them, as lucrative as it has been for some folks, seems to border on veneration and attribute qualities of beauty, playability, quality of tone that not every example actually has. It would be wise to remember that we are seeing Loars with eyes that are accustomed to a quality of construction by individuals tooday that was not usually achieveable even in the most sophisticated factories in America in the 1920s. Add to this the fact that tone wood was not as precious and was less carefully selected in the 20s than it is now.

I'm not saying that there are Loars of poor quality relative to current quality standards. I _am_ saying that today's mandolin makers have the benefit of Loar's design innovation without the drawbacks of 1920s era factory conditions and operating proceedures.

For example, examine the work of a current high end builder like Brentrup, Gilchrist, Kemnitzer, or Apitius in comparison to a Loar and you'll likely see in our makers' mandolins more attention to detail, cleaner construction, more carefully chosen woods (for beauty, tone, or both) than in the Loars. All of which lead to a higher quality mandolin than Gibson was capable of producing because of factory policy, workman skill, wood availability/choice, and quality of tools

In short, anything beyond an acknowlegement of Loar's mandolins as the innovative archetypes of American mandolin design runs the risk of ignoring the very benefit those innovations have had on modern mandolin construction.

Daniel

Posted: Fri - May 4, 2007 at 10:20 AM          

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