# General Mandolin Topics > eBay, Craig's List, etc. >  D'Angelico F style

## Charles E.

Here, aparently, is one of only two D'Angelico 'F' style mandolins known to George Gruhn. The other is shown on page 101 of George's book 'Acustic Guitars and other fretted instruments'.

http://cgi.ebay.com/VINTAGE-D-ANGELI...item4cf8db1363

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## sgarrity

That is, ummm.......interesting looking......I wonder how it sounds?

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## Andrew DeMarco

Weeeeeeeeeird. The scroll is kinda funny.

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## allenhopkins

Gruhn's appraisal is $15K.  Current bid is $830.  Quite a range there...!

"Lump" scroll, pickguard gouged out a bit to accommodate a pickup, generic bridge/tailpiece, some top wear.  The narrative seems to recall a working musician asking D'Angelico to build an instrument he didn't really want to build, a quasi-Gibson-copy.  To me, it would all hinge on how it sounded.  Probably impossible for D'Angelico to build an instrument that wasn't top-quality in terms of materials and workmanship.  A "rare bird" indeed, and it will be interesting to see what it sells for, since (apparently) there's no reserve on it.

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## multidon

Look at that scroll! How useless! There's no place to hang your strap! :Mandosmiley:

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## Charles E.

Allen, yea that struck me too. I looked at the bid and wondered why is this on eBay with no reserve. I hope it was not an error on the sellers part, if so and it goes for a couple of grand, he is not going to be happy.

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## Charles E.

The appraisal is from Feb. 1999. I guess it has been hanging around a while in their store, so on to eBay it goes.

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## mrmando

I'm with Gruhn on believing that the ultra-plain pickguard is not original. Not really John's style ... check out the beautiful bound pickguards on many of his other instruments. If Gruhn thought that tailpiece wasn't original, he didn't say so ... but again, that's a plain Waverly cloud, whereas John often made his own art-deco tailpieces for mandolins, many of which subsequently broke and were replaced by something like this Waverly. 

Not sure what makes the seller think this is John's last mandolin ... that isn't remotely true. If y'all don't want it, I'll buy it at the current bid.

...Whoops, she's up to $3,270. Somebody wants this mandolin after all.

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## barney 59

It would be nice to hear Michael Lewis' take on this.

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## Benjamin T

LA Guitar had this listed as 1940, but I am not sure why. The image I have seen of the inside is a D'Angelico stamp not a printed piece of paper. This instrument is on the database I am building regarding D'Angelico mandolins. I think it is very exciting to see this available. It is also very interesting that Vincent Gallo, actor and musician, is a D'Angelico collector and scholar.

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## Nat

I'm not a big fan of the Gumby style, but it's nice to see a D'Angelico for sale with so many detailed pictures.  The case is great. 

Makes you wonder about the amazing variety of D'Angelico mandolins, not just in terms of body shape and decoration, but also in quality.  For instance, it's funny that both the top and back binding meet a couple of inches off center from the tailpiece.  Not something we'd be too forgiving about in a modern maker.  

Also note the plugs for the positioning pins on the back, which I believe you usually only see on his sunburst instruments.  If this is the original blonde finish, it's interesting that he didn't bother to forego using those (which he knew how to do). 

Not as high-grade a mandolin as the other Gumby pictured on page 101 of the Gruhn book.  For instance, it seems like the fake scroll on this one is pretty much flat on the top... the equivalent scroll in the Gruhn book seems to have more countour to it, though it's hard to tell.

I believe I've read at least one other account of D'Angelico (later in his career) not wanting to build a mandolin for a client.  I've always wondered if that's because he just wanted to focus on guitars, or because the client was requesting a body shape or a style that he wasn't excited about building (for instance, was this Gumby shape something the client requested, or something D'Angelico came up with on his own?).  My ill-informed take is that these Gumby mandolins aren't something he seemed to have poured his heart into, if evidenced only by the small number of them he seems to have made (I challenge any of us to mount an aesthetic or sonic defense of the ersatz scroll).

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## Ben Milne

Multidon... No worries. Big lump like that=plenty of solid wood to install a strap button... :Wink:

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## P.D. Kirby

I would agree that this Mandolin does not display the attention to detail and workmanship that I have seen in most of D'Angelico's builds. While I have never had the pleasure of holding one of his Mandolins I have played one of his Archtop 6 strings (it lives down the street from me) and no doubt Mr. D'Angelico was in a class all his own. Could be that this Mandolin could be considered a D'Angelico beater?

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## multidon

Ok, so I made a little joke earlier about the "scroll", but seriously...in what way is this an "F" style? Gibson made lump scrolls in the 70's I think and called them F style, but I have seen posts on this forum where people say these aren't really F style and Gibson was just being cheap or lazy at the time, not wanting to pay the labor costs of actually carving scrolls. And there fore they are not considered desirable by the purists. So the thing is- granted, D'Angelico was a very fine instrument maker, no question. But if some other not so famous builder were to make a mandolin like this, with a flat lump scroll and some binding to make it look like a "scroll", and called it an F style, I can only imagine what kind of commentary that would get on this forum! So I would like to know, in this case, is the value in WHO made the instrument as opposed to the instrument itself?

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## Jim Garber

I have played a few D'A mandolins that didn't impress me all that much. There were two sunburst 2point ones with f-hole styles at a guitar show many years ago. At the time the selling prices were around $20K and they were not worth it IMHO. Then again the one at Mandolin Brothers for $15K is a sweet one tho it has some top damage from an after-maker bass-side pickguard. I have  also played a few others that were quite nice.

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## allenhopkins

Jim, let me just say that I really respect the breadth of your experience and knowledge.  To have played several D'Angelicos, rare as they are, gives you a perspective that most others can only get from reading and perhaps listening to recordings.  No substitute for hands-on experience!

As to whether the mandolin is an "F-style" or not, I think that the scrolled design is an _hommage_ to Gibson's F-models, but evidently D'Angelico -- who may have been reluctant to build the mandolin at all -- didn't want to go the whole "nine yards" and make a fully-carved F-model body.  So it has some of the aspects of a Gibson F-model, a similar basic silhouette, and we don't know that D'Angelico himself called it "F-style."  That's probably just the eBay seller's shorthand; in fact, he calls it "Gibson style" rather than "F-style."  I think we can all agree that D'Angelico was emulating Gibson's overall F-shape, since more of his mandolins were made without the scroll.

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## Jim Garber

Allen, thanks for the support, but I just have been at the right place at the right time. I have a friend from California who has one that is to die for, tho it is not at all that fancy -- just a plain A. Very sweet sounding.

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## multidon

Allen- I certainly understand what you say about it being a "homage" to the F style. I rather like the look and I am supportive in general of those who break the F style mold. It just amuses me to think about what would happen if an unknown maker would present that design on this forum. I believe there are those among us who would be quick to throw rotten tomatoes, figuratively speaking of course. There is a thread running right now making fun of "ugly" scrolls. Beauty, of course, is in the eye of the beholder. Who decided there is only one "right" way to do an F style scroll? I stand by my assessment that one big reason this particular mandolin is so valuable has more to do with the name on the headstock than the instrument itself. This is proven over and over with Gibsons. A bad sounding Gibson is often worth more than a good sounding "something else" because of the name. Not saying this one sounds bad, I just don't know. It does have very pretty wood though.

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## mrmando

It's a far better-looking "lump scroll" than the ones Gibson actually made. I think Nat may be on to something ... it could be that the original owner wanted a Gibson-style instrument and John's reluctance was more about making a Gibson copy than about making mandolins in general. 

He is credited with only 50-odd mandolins, but on the other hand that's a pretty significant chunk of his overall output. Benjamin would know: Does the logbook support the notion of any long gaps in mandolin-making, or are the mandolins fairly evenly distributed throughout?

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## Benjamin T

According to the logbook and other info I have there are gaps between 1925 to 1929 to 1933 to 1940 and 1943 to 1952 and 1952 to 1954. The period from 1940-1943 has the most descriptive entries in the log book and there do not seem to be large gaps in Dates or Serial numbers. I would really like to see the original books or facsimiles. 

For clarity's sake the logbooks have mandolins listed as plain, scroll, scroll (O), G.D. The designations Bowl, and F are, I think, posthumous designations, as there are a few "Bowlbacks", this and one other "F". There is an "Excel" at Gruhns, which gets its name from the inscribed headstock.

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## multidon

Well, I suppose it was inevitable. In the Vintage Instruments section, in the thread titled "Worst Scrolls of the Last Century", someone has nominated this D'Angelico!

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## mrmando

Lots of gaps! So he kept getting sucked back into the mandolin vortex, it sounds like.

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## mrmando

> in the thread titled "Worst Scrolls of the Last Century", someone has nominated this D'Angelico!


 Perhaps it isn't everything a scroll should be. But worst of the century? Not by a considerable margin.

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## Charles E.

Sorry Gent's, the 'F' style was my addition, altho Gruhn states it is "his version of Gibson's F-style". Maybe it should be called a Flump?

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## woodwizard

> Look at that scroll! How useless! There's no place to hang your strap!


If you look closely at the peghead ... there appears to be something there that looks sort of like a strap button ?    :Confused:  Guitars were for sure his thing.

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## delsbrother

> Lots of gaps! So he kept getting sucked back into the mandolin vortex, it sounds like.


Depression and Wars.. Not great for mandolins.

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## mrmando

Good for fifes and field drums, though.

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## Lowell Levinger

> If you look closely at the peghead ... there appears to be something there that looks sort of like a strap button ?    Guitars were for sure his thing.


That is a finial.  How other mandolin players get along without a finial is beyond me.

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## Schlegel

Finials were on many of the fancy Italian mandolins of earlier centuries... but they are much too delicate for strap buttons, as this likely is as well.  I like them, if the rest of the peghead is gracefully done.

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## grassrootphilosopher

There was the D´Angelico mandolin on the Tone Poems II CD ("Over The Rainbow"). That´s the only recording that I have with this kind of mandolin. Does anybody on here ever played one (plain, scroll etc.)? How do they sound, how do they play etc... When you look at the prices it seems interesting that they go for a lot less than the guitars.

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## Jim Garber

> Does anybody on here ever played one (plain, scroll etc.)? How do they sound, how do they play etc... When you look at the prices it seems interesting that they go for a lot less than the guitars.


GRP: see my post above.

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## Charles E.

Up to over eight grand with two days to go. I wonder if it will meet the appraisal.

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## f5loar

These rare F styles were cannons on sound.  While not quite the mellowness of a Loar sound these can stand up to Bones and prewar Flats easily.  I know at least one cafe member and one dealer that is not going to let it go for less then $10K.  Those DA guitar collectors look at this as an addition even if they don't play mandolin.  Too bad the pickguard is not original but getting a duplicate made from the one shown in the Gruhn book should be easy.

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## JFDilmando

I posted this elsewhere... but thought this comment might be interesting here as well.... I was speaking of the modification of the F4 design, leaving off the treble point, to allow easier access to high fret positions....  referring to, and comparison with Belson mandolin.

"I think this is an interesting modification in light of D'Angelico's take on the F5 design, currently for sale on ebay as well. In that F5 "copy" (sort of) the lower bottom point was omitted, and he kept the high point... just the reverse of this instrument modification. In my view... THIS one makes some sense... clears up obstruction to get to higher frets, AND keeps the value of the lower point in resting/holding position on leg in playing.... Both of those things I have thought about when playing... the benefit of that lower point ref an A model, to me is very beneficial... while the "treble point" really is a bit of a nuisance... one always gets used to whatever is in your hands to some degree..."
I can see the Belson modification... to me, I don't get the D'Angelico design, leaving out the the one point that makes sense .

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## mtucker

> Does anybody on here ever played one (plain, scroll etc.)? How do they sound, how do they play


Gilchrist played the asymmetrical oval that's at Gruhn now and said it was a great sounding mandolin.

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## mrmando

Hm. I just got a "security notice" from eBay saying it had removed this auction listing. (Kind of late on eBay's part, since the auction has been over for a while now.)

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