What is "Alpine Maple"

[Michael Nelson]

Kentucky is fond of calling the wood they use for back and sides "Alpine Maple", which seems strange to me. Alpine means to me high mountains, and I was under the impression that Maple is a much lower altitude species.

Is Alpine Maple some kinda Marketing Department BS?

[sunburst]

...Is Alpine Maple some kinda Marketing Department BS?

Yes.

[sunburst]

I assume that the marketing strategy is that maple trees grown at elevation grow slower and thus produce better wood. It is true that trees, on average, grow slower at altitude because of weather, shorter growing season and so forth, but it is not true that slow-grown maple is necessarily better than faster grown maple.

[Ray(T)]

The whole term to me sounds pointless. An “Alp” is, in fact, a grazing area located above the tree line.

[HoGo]

"Alpine spruce" among tonewood vendors usually means european spruce from Alps mountains. Perhaps they buy their maple and spruce wood from those same dealers and call the maple alpine as well.

[pheffernan]

Perhaps they buy their maple and spruce wood from those same dealers and call the maple alpine as well.

Maybe. My guess would be an empty term meaning that the spruce is sourced cheaply somewhere on Earth, which happens to have mountains.

[mandolinstew]

Next time I’m in the Swiss Alps I’ll look for some.

[rcc56]

To Saga, it probably means whatever they want it to mean.

And where is all the so-called "Adirondack spruce" in so many modern instruments really coming from?? Considering that most of the instrument sized eastern red spruce trees were farmed out years ago and that the number of younger surviving trees that have since reached instrument building size is quite limited, I have my doubts about the veracity of the descriptions used by many manufacturers.

[MikeEdgerton]

When I was young I worked for a chain of grocery stores in Portland, Oregon that advertised that they sold "Vine Ripened Tomatoes". One of my friends happened to work in the distribution center where they had these big plywood boxes they stored the tomatoes in before shipping them to the stores. The boxes were called (and labeled as) "Vine Ripeners".

A whole lot of what Gibson labeled as maple in their advertising in the early 1900's was birch if I recall. Apparently this concept is rooted in history.

[rcc56]

For the record, virtually all Gibson A models and F-2's were built of birch until sometime in the mid to late 1920's.
However, the catalogs from that period all specify maple. In other words, they lied.

F-4's and F-5's have always been maple except for a few very early instruments with walnut back and sides.
Where did the maple come from? Probably most of it from upper Michigan and Wisconsin.

The lesson to be learned from this is not to put too much stock into the accuracy of manufacturer's descriptions. This stuff has been going on for a very long time.

Also, learn to decipher "manufacturers' code," i.e. "spruce" usually means laminated spruce, "maple," "mahogany," and "rosewood" usually means laminated woods, "arched" means bent over a form, and "carved" usually means machine-routed. The various words used to describe finishes can mean darn near anything.
"Solid spruce" does indeed mean solid.

[Richard500]

And you might as well have a case covered in ‘fine Corinthian leather’ per R. Montalban. The car being hawked was the Chrysler Cordoba, which implies Spain, which implies an actor with an accent, and the irony of course, is that Cordoba really means horsehide, and Corinthian is just pulled out of, well, imagination.
When I worked for a Lictensteinian company (yes there are a few), we found that anything called ‘Swiss’ carriied vast posiitive market power, even in the rebranding of some ex Nazis.
And of course, Norwegian wood - isn’t it good.

[Jeff Mando]

...we found that anything called ‘Swiss’ carriied vast posiitive market power.....

(as an American) visiting Holland a few years ago, I told my host how much I liked the "Swiss" cheese on my sandwich.....his response surprised me, "SWISS cheese? No, that is Dutch cheese, of course!" offended that I didn't know the obvious!!? I blame American marketing for teaching me that cheese with holes in it is "Swiss" cheese.....

[Slack_Key]

"And where is all the so-called "Adirondack spruce" in so many modern instruments really coming from??"

Highly-flamed, Adirondack waiting to become Saga mandolins....

[John Soper]

I'd pair "Alpine Maple" with "Moon Spruce" for an ad man's special!

[sunburst]

I'd pair "Alpine Maple" with "Moon Spruce" for an ad man's special!

Combine those with hide glue, varnish and tap tuning and the $ky i$ the limit!

[Richard500]

[QUOTE=Slack_Key;1861686]"And where is all the so-called "Adirondack spruce" in so many modern instruments really coming from??"

Highly-flamed, Adirondack waiting to become Saga mandolins....

You broke the code: it’s really ‘all pine’

[rcc56]

And then there's "The Tree" and "The Log" and the "D Log," etc.
How about Luna Maple or Jupiter Maple or Aquarius Maple or [fill in the celestial body of your choice].

I recall going through the Adirondacks in the mid 1970's and seeing the endless rows of geometrically planted young pine trees. The land had been deforested a few decades earlier, and all the old growth wood was gone. I don't know what the exact species of the young trees is, but I'm sure an upstate NY member can contribute that information. I don't think it's Eastern Red Spruce, but even if it is, the trees are still far too young to be useful for instrument construction. At least they had the sense to put something back.

Good maple grows in a lot of places. The so-called "Alpine Maple" could very well have grown in China.

[CarlM]

Good maple grows in a lot of places. The so-called "Alpine Maple" could very well have grown in China.

In the Chinese Alps

[Hendrik Ahrend]

European violin makers use „Bergahorn“ (Acer pseudoplatanus), which translates to „Mountain Maple“, hence „Alpine Maple“.

[j. condino]

To Saga, it probably means whatever they want it to mean.

And where is all the so-called "Adirondack spruce" in so many modern instruments really coming from?? Considering that most of the instrument sized eastern red spruce trees were farmed out years ago and that the number of younger surviving trees that have since reached instrument building size is quite limited, I have my doubts about the veracity of the descriptions used by many manufacturers.

Have you ever driven over to visit the Hampton Brothers just a few hours away in East Tennessee? They locally harvest some of the finest picea rubens that you'll find anywhere in the world and supply almost all of the major manufacturers. Plus, they are some of the nicest guys in the tonewood business.

There is enough red spruce within 50 miles of my house to supply all of the instrument manufacturers for the next century if it was properly managed and harvested rather than being used for toilet paper mulch, picnic tables, and Home Depot 2x4s.

[sunburst]

Have you ever driven over to visit the Hampton Brothers just a few hours away in East Tennessee? They locally harvest some of the finest picea rubens that you'll find anywhere in the world and supply almost all of the major manufacturers. Plus, they are some of the nicest guys in the tonewood business.

There is enough red spruce within 50 miles of my house to supply all of the instrument manufacturers for the next century if it was properly managed and harvested rather than being used for toilet paper mulch, picnic tables, and Home Depot 2x4s.

James, unless you've made a major move since last I knew, you still don't live very close to any "Adirondack" spruce trees.

[j. condino]

Ha!

Actually, I grew up in the Adirondacks. If you travel up there in person, you'll see that the land is covered with spruce trees. It is not a problem finding it for small builders; it is just not as easy as cutting endless acres a day of sitka trees out west for major corporate suppliers.

My family still owns about 300 acres of land filled with "Adirondack" red spruce. I could harvest several lifetimes of wood for free. If I still lived up there, I'd have a tonewood business. But....I'm not fond of the northern latitude picea rubens. It is extremely dense and heavy with about a million growth lines per inch, & the late wood lines feel like they are made out of titanium. The more moderate picea rubens that grows local to me within an hour of Asheville is much more medium density. The mild local climate produces very even growth and density that suits my building preferences much better.

We've got an old cabin up on the family land that has giant roof trusses made from amazing picea rubens that was cut right after WW2. They look like the stuff of dreams and have been air drying for 3/4 of a century. I've been eyeballing them since I built my first guitar in 1980!

The reality is that picea rubens is local to me & I have access to an infinite amount for extremely fair prices- think 35 dreadnought tops for $100. When I lived in Oregon, I built from local sitka spruce. If I lived in Condino, Italy I'd build from the local Italian spruce. They all sound like my mandolins....

[rcc56]

" . . . They all sound like my mandolins . . . "
And that's the bottom line . . .

Some years ago, I spoke with Lynn Dudenbostel about building a guitar for me. He asked "What kind of top would you like?" I responded, "Your best piece of spruce with the liveliest tap tone, I don't care about the variety." He smiled.

But I didn't order from Lynn-- After some thought, I decided I was getting too old to wait five years until my name came to the top of the list. Maybe I should have gone through with it.

At the time, he said that the best spruce he had came from eastern Europe, but he didn't use much of it. Most of his customers had their hearts set on eastern red spruce, probably harvested somewhere between where he lives and James lives. And no, there are no Adirondack mountains in Tennessee or North Carolina. James should really call his stuff "Smoky Mountain Spruce." Actually, that doesn't sound bad at all. And at least it's accurate.

I will suggest that it's more likely that Martin's "Adirondack Spruce" from the old days probably came mostly from the Poconos, and maybe also occasionally from the Catskills and Berkshires. The Adirondacks were farther away. If you read Spann's book about Gibson, it can be inferred that they probably got at least some of their spruce from upper Michigan and perhaps Wisconsin.

A student of mine who has quite a bit of knowledge [by trade] of wood did a little research and found that there are two species of spruce specifically native to Michigan, and one, known as Michigan White Spruce, grows large enough for guitar tops.

Here's a question for y'all-- Why doesn't anyone build out of birch? Gibson [and others] made some very fine instruments out of it back in the day [even though they lied in their catalogs and called it maple]. . . . And now we're right back where we started.
"Nothing is new under the sun."

[Dave Hanson]

A long time ago I had a 1913 Gibson ' A ' model mandolin with birch back and sides, it was a great sounding instrument.

Dave H

[BradKlein]

"Why doesn't anyone build out of birch? Gibson [and others] made some very fine instruments out of it back in the day [even though they lied in their catalogs and called it maple]."

Birch generally doesn't look as good as maple. Not that there aren't examples of stunningly figured birch. But in general maple is going to look better, stain more evenly, and be available in more figured variations.

This sort of question comes up a lot over the years. I think the key to understanding it is: the biggest cost of a musical instrument by far is LABOR in the present day. That wasn't always so over the past several hundred years what with indentured employees, apprentices, child labor et c. In the past, MATERIALS were often a much greater percentage of the total cost of many hand-crafted items, so saving money on materials was a priority.