Nothing specific regarding The Renaissance Gilde. However, in general, features that make for less playable musical instruments or that are just plain weird without any demonstrable benefits rarely (i.e., almost never) enhance value. Any exceptions tend to be among large commercial entities with large distribution and a large base of weird collectors: e.g., a Loyd Loar-signed Gibson with a Virzi "Tone Producer" intact might have some enhanced value. But a generally weird, early lute from The Renaissance Gilde? Probably not. If you got this for a good price, and can have it rendered functional for a good price, I recommend you go forth and enjoy.
Best, Eugene -----Original Message----- From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On Behalf Of jeffrey bunce Sent: Sunday, August 11, 2013 1:53 PM To: Wayne Cripps Subject: [LUTE] Advice regarding a lute Hello, All! I was wondering if anyone could offer me some advice regarding a lute that I acquired recently. The maker, according to the label in the belly of the lute was "The Renaissance Gilde, Box 193, Cambridge Wisconsin. No year of construction is given. I understand the "The Renaissance Gilde" is synonymous with a William Daum, from whom Paul O'Dette, who mentioned this in his interview, acquired his first "real lute" in 1972. It is a 7 course lute with a 65 cm scale length-I'm guessing that it was made in the 1960s or '70s-very lightweight and resonant, but with warping of the soundboard in front of the bridge and a small place where the soundboard has separated from the back end of the lute. Also, whoever tied the frets on-all nylon and all the same guage-, tied them on much too tightly, so that there are indentations in the edge of the fingerboard and on the back of the neck itself. This lute has some odd features: Strangely, the body of the lute has no capping strip and never had one, and as a result, a few of the ends of the ribs have come unglued from the block. I don't know if all lutes came with capping strips, but this feature seems to be a pretty fundamental part of lute construction. Also, the fingerboard is oddly shaped-it goes from being thin at the body and tapering to a much greater thickness at the pegbox to form a kind of large shim. The width of the neck does match the string spacing of the bridge and nut-there is about 1 cm of space between the treble string and the edge of the neck and fingerboard. My real issue, however, is this: Even though I know that there is much that I could do myself, or have a professional luthier do, to make this instrument more playable, it is these odd features that make me question whether or not this lute is some kind of prototype or special project. If so, I hesitate to make any modifications in case this lute may be worth a lot more money. So far, I've done some research on the internet to try to find more about the maker and contact him and I was able to find a telephone number, but when I dialed it, it was no longer in service. If anyone could offer some advice or information, especially regarding instruments made by The Renaissance Gilde, I would be most grateful. Thanks! -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
