Well-known builders who say instruments don't open up?

[Buck]

I don't think many (any?) builders will say that instruments do not change with time and/or play, which is what I think you mean by "opening up". The real disagreement in the conversations I've heard is about how fast and how much. Does it take 5 years or 50 years for an instrument to mature? Does an instrument go from a 7 to a 9.5 or from a 8.9 to a 9.1?

I think you'll find plenty of builders debating those questions, but few debating whether it happens at all.

[MikeEdgerton]

Willie, you might be missing the entire controversy here. The controversy is that some people say they hear that, some people say they don't. That fellow a long time ago would come in the first group of people.

[june39]

I have been waiting 40 years for my 70 year old F5 to open up. I gave it to Randy Wood to really "open it up". I pick it up next week.

Doug McCash

[fscotte]

Opening up is like getting old. You look at yourself in the mirror every morning and you don't really notice the changes. But someone who hasn't seen you in 20 years notice the effects of age immediately. If you LOOK for the signs of aging you'll find them, but if you don't look then you won't notice.

[Explorer]

Fscotte, there are actually some very audible changes which happen the first few days of an instrument being played, and some which are more gradual. The reason I was curious about any known luthiers who had never heard that initial bloom is because I've never met one who hadn't.

Having heard quite a bit of outspoken opinion over the years between classical guitar builders, I don't think it impossible for a well-known builder to put out a strong opinion which might shake a possible customer's confidence. Is it really possible that steel-string guitar and mandolin makers are so timid? That just doesn't seem too likely to me, but one never knows. It would take only one who had the courage of his convictions... *but*, who also had never heard that initial bloom of sound in the first hours of stringing and playing. I've never run across such a person in my contacts with any of the various guilds and associations of luthiers, which is why I asked if anyone else here had heard of anyone fitting the bill.

Is it really possible that folks like Taylor, Collings, Lowden, Breedlove, Somogyi, Siminoff and others are just fooling themselves or just out to make a buck? For some reason, I'd trust their ears more than an anonymous poster on the internet who argues against "opening up." My suspicion is that there is *no* known and reputable builder who hasn't heard the bloom of "opening up."

At least in terms of wooden instruments.

Because, incidentally, I found a counterexample. There is one group which, pretty much as a monolithic group, generally doesn't expect much opening up, if any, in the instruments they make: makers of carbon fiber instruments.

Of course, carbon fiber is a more resilient material when it comes to flexing. That's why it's used for applications where one wants a material which doesn't become more flexible over time...



...unlike wood, which does become more flexible over time.

----

I didn't think that this topic was trolling. What I was trying to do was simple, just pointing out what is being argued when one says that "opening up" hasn't really be observed.

"There are a ton of world class luthiers who acknowledge the phenomenon, but they are all wrong. They produce world class instruments, but I know better about instrument construction than they... even though I don't produce such instruments. Wood cannot become more flexible in a musical instrument, regardless of what someone observes, and, short a scientific test, one cannot prove I'm wrong about that assertion."

I was just hoping that there was someone on the non-bloom side who had figured out how to build great instruments and was recognized for it. That would make it an actual controversy, instead of assertions in search of evidence.

Cheers!

[JEStanek]

I found this interesting

For some reason, I'd trust their ears more than an anonymous poster on the internet who argues against "opening up."

.... and you are?

I'm still trying to figure out what you really are after. Yes, builders are out to make a buck, along with making their best product each time. I feel that mandolin's sound does change some over time. There are several reasons for it, IMO.
1) Maybe the woods, when the plates are carved optimally (or planed for flat tops) do respond over time.
2) Maybe I learn how this particular instrument responds the best.
3) Maybe the saddle resettles and the strings settle into the nut after a string change over a few hours
and so on.

I would never buy or recommend someone buy an instrument based on a nebulous, it'll sound way better after some play time. Maybe it will maybe it won't. Maybe it'll just sound different. In the first few days/months you may get different sounds as the finish and glues cure, maybe this is from the wood changing too? How do we validate that claim? Frequencies? I think, best case, you might be able to generate some data to show very generalized trends. I don't think you'll generate data you can apply to all mandolins. Lots of variables. As a scientist, I find some of the ideas behind trying to figure the post build changes very interesting. As a musician, I feel like it sucks the soul out of what I should be using the instrument for.

Jamie

[catmandu2]

I found this interesting
.... and you are?

Touché

[hank]

OK! everybody back on your heads! Enough of all these soul sucking arguments about the effects of time and vibration. Mr. mystery wood stirrer tell us more about your 12 string Ovation Mandophone tuned in fifths in a new thread. I'm a lot more interested in guitar mutation with variations of fifths. I had my first taste of mutant audio indulgence with DADDAD amplified hammer on magic inspired by Mr. Billy McLaughlin on my Ovation Elite Special. Little did I know back then that the same double stop melodies I wrote would transfer identically to mandolin. Funny how these things circle back on themselves.

[SincereCorgi]

"There are a ton of world class luthiers who acknowledge the phenomenon, but they are all wrong. They produce world class instruments, but I know better about instrument construction than they... even though I don't produce such instruments. Wood cannot become more flexible in a musical instrument, regardless of what someone observes, and, short a scientific test, one cannot prove I'm wrong about that assertion."

I was just hoping that there was someone on the non-bloom side who had figured out how to build great instruments and was recognized for it. That would make it an actual controversy, instead of assertions in search of evidence.

Cheers!

It's a tacky strawman gambit – and it's definitely trolling – to invent a ridiculous quote and put it into the mouths of everybody who doesn't agree with you. Moreover, I think there's a certain amount of moving the goalposts when it comes to the 'opening up' argument. I don't think anybody asserts that mandolins don't change in the first few days after they've been completed, and probably for a while after that. The question of 'opening up' is – and maybe I'm all wrong about this - whether instruments change for the better over several years of playing.

Foldedpath posted this:

http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/powerhousetwins.html

in one of the last, endless, opening-up threads. That's the only scientific study of 'opening up' I've seen. It's not some perfect double-blind study conducted with a gigantic sample size, but at least it's something instead of just a bunch of anecdotal evidence.

[Charley wild]

The OP is just trolling as has been suggested. It's his favorite subject. Tune in again in a couple or three months and he'll have another twist on the same tired subject. His conclusions are ALWAYS the same, i.e. anyone who disagrees is not bright or subtle enough to hear an instrument opening up or they just plain aren't too bright period.
He can call me any name he wants, insinuate anything he wants in his usual patronizing manner but he won't hear from me again. As with the Blue Chip pick threads I'm through with "opening up" threads!

[re simmers]

60 replies!

[jim_n_virginia]

The OP is just trolling as has been suggested. It's his favorite subject. Tune in again in a couple or three months and he'll have another twist on the same tired subject. His conclusions are ALWAYS the same, i.e. anyone who disagrees is not bright or subtle enough to hear an instrument opening up or they just plain aren't too bright period.
He can call me any name he wants, insinuate anything he wants in his usual patronizing manner but he won't hear from me again. As with the Blue Chip pick threads I'm through with "opening up" threads!

I agree ... trolling ... That's why the mods said in the very beginning they are gonna watch this thread. Frankly I'm surprised it hasn't been shut down already. TJ I hope you got your enjoyment or kick!

I'm outta this one for good ... but the B.C pick thead no way not yet! LOL!

[JeffD]

Foldedpath posted this:

http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/powerhousetwins.html

in one of the last, endless, opening-up threads. That's the only scientific study of 'opening up' I've seen. It's not some perfect double-blind study conducted with a gigantic sample size, but at least it's something instead of just a bunch of anecdotal evidence.

What a well written article about a well constructed experiment. What ever one thinks, its very interesting. Thanks for that. The results were not what I would have expected.

[Ron McMillan]

Z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-

[Phil Goodson]

To be honest, I WOULD be more secure about "opening up" if, just once, someone posted that the sound of their instrument had really gotten WORSE after a few years.

It's hard for me to believe that EVERYONE likes the sound of their instrument MORE after it goes through whatever changes it goes through, if it goes through some, if ......

Know what I mean?

But maybe no one wants to say that they don't like their favorite mando any more.
<troll shields reactivated>

[JeffD]

To be honest, I WOULD be more secure about "opening up" if, just once, someone posted that the sound of their instrument had really gotten WORSE after a few years.

I guess I don't follow this. What is so inconceivable about a one way process? Nature is full of them. Paper oxidizes over time. It doesn't sometimes un-oxidize. When it oxidizes it turns yellow/brown, and brittle. Why should it sometimes turn brighter white?

If the phenomena is one in which the wood becomes more flexible with exposure to playing, (an "if" I admit), why should it sometimes become less flexible with playing. If more flexible wood results in a more pleasing sound, why should more flexible wood sometimes result in a less pleasing sound?

[Nick Triesch]

I bought my James Goodall standard guitar 30 years ago because it sounded so huge and powerful. After all these years it still sounds exactly the same....huge and powerful. You just get a good one from the start! Nick

[thorin68]

It's funny the more subtle a phenomenon the more people will disagree.what seems obvious to some is less so to others.I guess that's where science steps in but somethings are beyond it's tools of measurement.I guess this one saddles the fence into the area of metaphysics the way people argue about it,for me it's very obvious.Personally I don't see how it could not happen on "some" instruments,but there you go.But I'm not a builder just someone who's owned and played many instruments over the last 25 years.

[JEStanek]

I think, to Philphool's point, this might happen but isn't expressed as such. You don't help yourself to make a sale by saying, "My instrument's voice has changed ina way I don't like anymore." That's bad marketing. There are plenty of used instruments out there. I bet many of them don't sound the same as when they were first bought, and I bet finances and neck shape aren't the only reason they're being sold. The good news is, the sound that I don't like, someone else may feel is their voice.

Jamie

[peterleyenaar]

I agree ... trolling ... That's why the mods said in the very beginning they are gonna watch this thread. Frankly I'm surprised it hasn't been shut down already. TJ I hope you got your enjoyment or kick!

I'm outta this one for good ... but the B.C pick thead no way not yet! LOL!

My B.C. pick has improved tremendously over the 2 weeks I have been playing it :-)

[Dave Cohen]

Ra Inta's work is not the first or only such on the subject. I have offered at least one of these references on the Cafe forum before, but most seem to ignore them. Here (again) are two references for your consideration:

(1) Ling, D.; Killion, M.; "NEW VERSUS OLD: Playing-in Instruments through Vibratory Transmission of Music to the Bridge"; Catgut Acoustical Society Journal, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Series II), pp 42-4, May, 1997.

(2) Hutchins, C.M.; "A MEASUREABLE EFFECT OF LONG-TERM PLAYING ON VIOLIN FAMILY INSTRUMENTS"; Catgut Acoustical Society Journal, Vol. 3, No. 5, (Series II), pp 38-40, May, 1998.

Whether or not these works add anything conclusive to the discussion is another matter.

http://www.Cohenmando.com

[buckles]

Dave, for those of us without access to the Catgut journal, can you summarize the conclusion(s) of these articles? Or have you already done that elsewhere on this forum?

[Bertram Henze]

To be honest, I WOULD be more secure about "opening up" if, just once, someone posted that the sound of their instrument had really gotten WORSE after a few years

I guess I don't follow this. What is so inconceivable about a one way process? Nature is full of them. Paper oxidizes over time. It doesn't sometimes un-oxidize. When it oxidizes it turns yellow/brown, and brittle. Why should it sometimes turn brighter white?

Same here - physicists call it the 2nd law of thermodynamics. That does not mean that all one-way-processes have a desirable result, but it certainly means that temporal symmetry is not a criterium for credibility. BTW the 2nd law does not say that reversion of those one-way-processes is impossible, just that it is so improbable that you can't hardly expect a few mandolinists to make a big enough sample for observing the exception even once.

[f5loar]

I didn't read all 73 post but my 2 cents is this , it's either got it or it don't and I can tell that within 3 minutes of picking it.
This would be on a properly "set up" mandolin. You can do some little things to help improve it but it will never get up to the level of one that has got it. I don't know about the independent builders now but years ago if you ordered a mandolin from XXXX he would build 2 of them and let you pick which one you liked and then sell the one you didn't like to a dealer or the next guy who wanted one right then not knowing it had already been picked as 2nd best of two made. That is not to say the 2nd best is a dud it was just not as good in some buyers opinion.

[hank]

Philphool's original Quote

"To be honest, I WOULD be more secure about "opening up" if, just once, someone posted that the sound of their instrument had really gotten WORSE after a few years.

It's hard for me to believe that EVERYONE likes the sound of their instrument MORE after it goes through whatever changes it goes through, if it goes through some, if ...... "

I have heard at least one builder say that you can build a mandolin that sounds exceptional when completed but begins to sound worse the older and more flexible it becomes. This also explains top sinkage and collapses not associated with temperature and humidity that have occurred . Too much flexibility without enough rigidness(torn fiber in the woods cell structure) probably starts a downhill trend with working stress toward loss of responsiveness, tone and power. All in all it's still about the Luthier and how well he understands his art and his ability to get the most out of his sound plates without removing too much of it's rigidness.