Making the Manulenjo

Noel Collaborates with David LaPlante, Luthier

David LaPlante is a renowned luthier who has produced guitars for many amateur and professional musicians, including several for Peter and me. He has been recognized as a restorer of early C.F. Martin guitars, and his work can be seen at the C.F. Martin Museum and the Farmer’s Museum in Cooperstown, New York. 

Earlier this year, I approached David with an unusual request. Would he make an instrument that combines characteristics of the guitar, the mandolin, and the banjo? I already had some ideas on how this instrument would be constructed, and David took the project from there. The result was the manulenjo, a short-necked banjo shaped wooden-bodied instrument with four doubled steel strings, the bottom four in octaves (like a 12 string guitar) tuned the same as a ukulele. 

After LaPlante completed our prototype, the sound proved so unique that I was inspired to write “Dance to the Manulenjo” to celebrate (as a metaphor) three of our country's diverse ethnic and musical cultures: MANdolin (Italian), ukULEle (PortUguese) and baNJO (Africa). The resultant song (which I’ll post next week) also touches on some current political challenges, but first I wanted to share with you this video of David explaining how the MAN-YOU-LANE-YO was constructed.  nps

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Connections

Visit David LaPlante's website to learn more about his work.

To learn more about luthiers to The Guild of American Luthiers, a nonprofit membership organization whose purpose is to facilitate learning about lutherie: the art, craft, and science of stringed instrument building and repair.