Loupe_Article_Dec_20..

Clarington luthier
Mike Coleman
makes wood sing
Luthier Mike Coleman with two of his finished guitars.
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loupe
Luthier Mike Coleman uses
a bandsaw to rough-cut the
top of a guitar.
Building guitars
‘a wonderful experience’
Story by Mike Ruta l Photos by Sabrina Byrnes
C
larington luthier Mike Coleman is captivated by a certain
Pikasso. It’s not a painting by the
Spanish artist, but definitely a work of
art, a one-of-a-kind harp guitar built by
master luthier Linda Manzer of Toronto
for jazz guitarist Pat Metheny. Coleman
says Metheny’s instructions to her were
to build a guitar with as many strings as
possible. And Manzer came through, creating a 42-string, four-neck monster and
masterpiece.
“It’s absolutely beautiful,” Coleman
says, noting the instrument has more
than 1,000 pounds of string pressure.
“If something fails, it will fail spectacularly.”
Coleman isn’t quite there yet. Manzer
has been building guitars for a few decades while he’s been at it for just a few
years. But he doesn’t shy away from a
challenge and says while he needs another 30 years in the trenches before he can
tackle something like the Pikasso, “that’s
on my list.”
A visit to his Bowmanville century
home, which he shares with wife Andrea,
December, 2014
dog Willow and cat Spot, begins with
apologies. Coleman is fixing up the place
and the animals leave a lot of hair around.
And then there’s the dust created when he
sands and cuts wood while building guitars. Fair to say they’re not ready to host a
dinner party today.
“It’s dusty,” he says. “It’s not good for
the animals we have in the house and my
wife.”
Coleman says he’s in a state of transition at the moment. He works on
instruments both in an upstairs room in
the house and in “the barn,” an out-building in the backyard. He will eventually
move the entire operation out to the barn,
but it needs to be upgraded. Coleman requires a consistent climate for his work.
Originally from St. Mary’s, he has
been in Clarington for roughly three
years. He moved to Toronto when he was
18 and lived there for two decades.
A guitarist himself, Coleman was
looking for some pretty specific features
on a guitar, like an electric with an acoustic pickup in it, so he decided to make his
own. A self-confessed do-it-yourselfer,
Using a bending iron to the bend the
sides of a guitar to shape.
The guitar frames are made. The back
frame has been glued and clamped
while it dries and the shape keeps in
place.
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Coleman uses a go-deck to glue down the back braces.
he constructed his first guitar, an electric,
from a kit. For the next one, he made his
own modifications: he started with the
stock neck and body but made everything
else himself, describing it as “a custom
built from a kit.” Coleman wanted to
take things to the next level in his guitarmaking and did a lot of research looking
for a luthier from whom he could learn to
make wood sing.
“Pretty much everyone said the same
thing; go to Sergei,” he says.
So one-and-half years ago he visited
master luthier Sergei de Jonge in Quebec,
going to school for five weeks with two or
three other apprentices.
Coleman explains that de Jonge would
take his students through the process step
by step, explaining how to do each and
leaving it in their hands: pick your wood,
now glue the two halves of the top together, now do the same with the back and so
on.
“I got bitten hard by the bug,” Coleman says. “It was a wonderful experience,
completely exhausting.”
30
After an eight-hour day, Coleman and
the other students would eat and then go
back to work.
“I literally lived and breathed it for
those five weeks,” he says.
The guitar he built under de Jonge’s
tutelage was at first put for sale on his
website for $4,000. But it wasn’t online for
long: it’s special to him and Coleman decided he wanted to hang on to it.
And that’s how he started. But before
he could become a luthier, he first had to
build up his tools for his shop, which he
says took a long time. Some he built himself.
If he works on a guitar full time, it will
take six or seven weeks.
The first step is deciding on the woods
and Coleman says “there are a lot of
schools of thought” on how to go about
it. If a certain wood in the lumberyard
catches his eye, “I’ll buy it and see how it
sounds.” Some have a dark sound, others
have sharp highs.
“As I go I’m learning more,” he says.
“Most of my guitars I’ve used several
woods. Experimentation is happening.”
Asked what makes his guitars different, Coleman says each of his instruments
is unique, not a cookie-cutter creation.
“I think if you’re going out of your way
to buy a homemade acoustic guitar, you
don’t want a guitar that looks like everybody else’s Martin,” he says. “You want
something that’s unique to you. I think
I’m also a lot more willing to go outside
the box."
“I think I’m definitely more willing to
experiment and take a chance on something.”
His website, www.blacksheepguitar.
com, is so titled to reflect this willingness
to go in an uncommon, new direction.
But passion and bold creativity haven’t
equalled sales just yet. It’s a tough industry to break into, he says. It would take,
for instance, a musician of the calibre of
a Metheny requesting and then playing
one of Coleman’s guitars. Carlos Santana,
Stephen Fearing, Bruce Cockburn and
Paul Simon are among the musicians who
own a guitar built by Manzer. She builds
loupe
A plane is used to carve the back braces for a guitar.
Placing his label inside of the guitar.
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Using a bandsaw to trim the neck of a guitar.
December, 2014
conniesinbrooklin.com
31
Giving the guitar a French
polish, the first of many
coats.
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around 15 a year, ranging in price from
$18,000 to start for a flattop and $25,000
for an archtop.
Coleman has an Etsy Store, selling his
instruments online. And you can find his
instruments at Wilson and Lee Music
Store in Oshawa, The Hand’s On Music
Company in Bowmanville and he hopes
to have his guitars in Gigs Music in Bowmanville as well.
“They’ll take my guitars on consignment, show them to whoever’s interested,”
he says, adding the stores take a 10- to 15per cent commission.
Coleman’s guitars range from $2,000
to $3,000.
“A lot of people are interested and like
the look of my stuff and think it sounds
great; that isn’t really translating into
sales,” he says.
Someone spending thousands on a
guitar is going to shop around, obviously.
And there are a lot of options out there.
Coleman has done a couple of shows, including Bowmanville Summerfest, and
plans on doing it again next year because
he got a lot of good feedback.
A computer programmer for 20
years before he took a detour to become
a luthier, Coleman is again working as a
programmer, in Oshawa. The bills he and
his wife have to pay won’t wait for sales to
pick up speed.
“She’s been fantastic,” Coleman says of
Andrea. “To the point where it made me
feel guilty because I was going to try and
build things and the money wasn’t coming in and that put a lot of pressure on
her.”
Not that he’s left guitar-making behind. He says the feeling is “something
else” when he puts a set of strings on an
instrument he’s built.
As for future constructions, Coleman
says “there’s a lot of little projects I’ve got
in my head.” He’s working on his first
mandolin. He wants to build a doubleneck, a six-string guitar and a mandolin
with one body. A lyre is also on his to-do
list.
“If I see something and think it’s cool
or I think of something, I’m definitely
going to write that down and keep it
squirrelled away until I get a chance to
build it,” Coleman says.
The neck
alignment is
checked to
make sure it is
centered.
Luthier Mike Coleman's finished guitar.
Placing the frets
on a guitar.
The finished
product.
December, 2014
33