This History of the Mandolin was compiled by Daniel Coolik, a high school student from Atlanta, Georgia (1998).
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History of the Mandolin in America
Daniel Coolik
November 18, 1998
What is a mandolin? A mandolin is a stringed instrument that is a cousin of the lute dating back to Italy and the 1700s. There are many different kinds of body shapes, but the one that was played in Italy is the Neapolitan mandolin. It has a deep pear shaped body, an oval sound hole, and four pairs of strings (Bronze or Steel) tuned like a violin (Mandolin). The great violin maker Antonio Stradivari even made mandolinos, which is Italian for mandolin. He had designed half a dozen different body patterns for his mandolinos (Tyler 18). In the past five years there has been an increasing interest in the mandolin. Some people might say it is a first coming of an old time instrument. Actually, this is the instrument's second coming in this century (Herndon 1). The mandolin is on the country radio stations and was featured by the popular band R.E.M in a music video on MTV (Herndon 2). In a poll taken by Acoustic Musician magazine 90% of the readers played guitar, but most surprising is that two-thirds of the readers also played mandolin (Herndon 1). There are many luthiers that build some of the finest mandolins, arguably ever. For instance, Steve Gilchrist, John Monteleone, and many others are making some of the finest handmade mandolins today and they, as well as many others, all began where Lloyd Loar left off (Herndon 4-5). Actually, this renaissance is very similar to the one around the turn of this century. In America the mandolin has had a history stemming from an Irish immigrant instrument, a classical music instrument, a lead instrument in Bluegrass music; and while in America, it has evolved in shape and style.
From the 1890s into the early years of the 20th century, America "possessed what was by now the world's largest community of Italian immigrants," and with their luggage they also brought their culture (Sparks 120). Not surprising is around this time the increasing popularity of the mandolin. Around the time of the first substantial immigration to America, the popular taste was for exotic and foreign things, such as the mandolin (Cantwell 222). The mandolin "shared the parlor with zithers, mandolas, ukuleles, and other novelties designed to amuse the increasingly leisured middle class" (Cantwell 221). The instrument was primarily used by amateurs seeking simple recreational fun. They played "waltzes, sentimental parlor songs, college songs, light classical music, and marches, as well as vaudeville-style ragtime and cakewalks" (Sparks 126). The instrument was primarily played in small spaces where it could be heard easily and sometimes accompanied by guitar or piano.
The mandolin, in the 1890s, was most popular in those "fashion-conscious eastern cites of Boston, Washington, DC, and Philadelphia, and also New York" (Sparks 126). It was also popular in other cities such as Kansas City. It was so popular that, to give off a false impression that they were Society ladies, shop-girls would carry around mandolin cases. Within these cities the mandolin thrived in clubs, for almost every college had its own mandolin club (Sparks 126). It was an instrument that was taken up by both sexes for amusement, recreation, and also for serious study for a musical education. Because of its adaptability, portability, and the pleasure drawn, the mandolin stood without a rival (Sparks 126-127).
Not all of the mandolin players were amateurs; there were some professionals of importance. One of the most prominent Italians was Giuseppe Pettine, who was born in Isernia (Italy) and settled with his family in Providence, Rhode Island. Soon after his move, Pettine was touring the states as a concert mandolinist. He was also important for he published his six-volume mandolin method in 1896, which was one of the most comprehensive works to be published in America (Sparks 121).
Another important early American performer, Samuel Adelstein, who visited Italy seeking teaching, returned to America and gave a major public concert at Metropolitan Hall in his home town of San Francisco in 1891. In the 1890s, Adelstein gave the first mandolin concerts in Portland, Oregon, and Sitka, Alaska. (Sparks 121).
Another player, Valentine Abt, in Pittsburgh, studied violin and taught himself to play the mandolin. One of his most famous works was Impromptu, because it was such an advanced piece to play for unaccompanied mandolin. This new style of Abt's showed the possibilities of the solo mandolin to Americans. "In about 1908, Abt formed the first American classical plectrum quartet-two mandolins, tenor mandola, and mandocello" (Sparks 122).
Zarh Myron Bickford and Aubrey Stauffer left their mark for other performers. Zarh Myron Bickford contributed his four-volume Bickford Mandolin Method as well as many intelligently written pieces. "Aubrey Stauffer, from Denver, Colorado, left some 300 solo compositions and transcriptions that testify to a truly astonishing technique" (Sparks 123).
Most mandolinists did not play for classical music audiences but rather played in noisy vaudeville acts. Although, some performers did make their way out of cigarette butts and beer to champagne and cigars. Samuel Siegel was one performer who made it out of the vaudeville circuit. Siegel, born in Des Moines, Iowa, believed he had a leg up because unlike his contemporaries he started playing mandolin first before violin (Sparks 123). He believed this helped because most of the other players were used to bowing a violin and not used to a plectrum (or pick), and "to this I attribute the fact that I understand the right hand far better than some great players" (Sparks 124). "In 1900, Siegel became the first mandolinist to record on Emile Berliner's newly invented sic system. 'Nearer my God to Thee', the first of several dozen recordings he made during the next few years, was performed in a solo version that displayed his technique to a full" (Sparks 125). By the end the 1890s Siegel was out of the vaudeville and was considered the best American performer. Siegel could not read music well, but had visions that the future of the mandolin could not solely base itself on violin transcriptions, but to evolve they would have to write original compositions (Sparks 124).
The mandolin was not only for the white middle class. Seth Weeks, a black man, who toured America, Canada, and Britain in the late 1890s had a technique that was arguably better than Siegel's. (Sparks 125).
Two of the many journals in America that were important for the mandolin were "the Cadenza (1894-1924, New York and Boston), published by Partee, who was also largely responsible for the founding of the American Guild of Banjoists, Mandolinists, and Guitarists in 1902; and the Crescendo (1908-33, Boston)" (Sparks 127). Both of the journals attempted to elevate the mandolin form a cheap vaudeville instrument to one of classical status. Because of the development of the duo-style in America, the journals attested that the Americans were far ahead of their contemporaries in Europe (Sparks 127).
Many people in America demanded the serious study of musical instruments. This enthusiasm led to the American Guild of Banjoists, Mandolinists, and Guitarists (1902). The guild's case was "that fretted instruments were ideally suitable for schoolchildren commencing music tuition, a contention that had the full backing of USA manufactures, who saw a huge potential for increased sales" (Sparks 128).
American mandolin-manufacturing grew rapidly in the 1890s because European imports were of poor quality and the high import tariffs made American made mandolins more affordable and sought after. Lyon and Healy of Chicago were the largest manufacturers around this time, who would "recruit Italian and Spanish workmen and, by 1894, were making 7,000 mandolins annually" (Sparks 128). The well known guitar company C. F. Martin & Co. added the mandolin to their manufacturing in 1896 (Sparks 129). The mandolins were shipped all over America, especially in the rural south, by popular mail order catalogues, such as Sears and Montgomery Ward (Beimborn 3).
Most of the mandolins made before 1900 in American were the standard Neapolitan style. But Valentine Abt used one of the first American innovations on the mandolin. Abt used a particular mandolin, whose body was made from aluminum, that was made by the Aluminum Musical Instrument Company in 1897 (patented by Neil Merrill in 1896). These mandolins sold very well until the flat-backs of Orville Gibson took over (Sparks 129).
Orville Gibson, born in 1856 in Chateaugay, New York, became the American who revolutionized the mandolin. Orville began designing and making instruments around the 1880s in Kalamazoo, Michigan (Grisman 7). Gibson "believed that aged, dry wood was superior to newly cut wood, and he was known for seeking old furniture as a source of seasoned wood" (Gruhn 70). Gibson borrowed the idea of carving the top into an arch shape from violins. He was granted a patent in 1898 "not for his carved-top design that would revolutionize the mandolin and eventually the guitar. The patent was for an equally radical concept: the sides and neck are carved out of a single piece of wood, and the neck is carved partially hollow in order to increase the volume of air in the body" (Gruhn 70). Gibson's "patented design was not at all successful," but the carved-top design "quickly became and remains the industry standard" (Gruhn 69). Gibson's instruments were also deeper and longer than most of their contemporaries (Gruhn 71).
Orville Gibson made no more than a dozen instruments a year, most of which are very ornate in design, but he did impress a group of investors enough to form the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Mfg. Co., Ltd on November 11, 1902 (Gruhn 71). The name was changed to "simply t