1920s Iucci Style 2 Tenor Lute

Iucci instruments are rare on their own but a tenor harp made by Iucci? Crazy!

For those not in the know, at the time tenor lute and tenor harp in fretted instruments meant a tenor guitar in the form of a mandolin (tenor lute) or banjo (tenor harp, per Lange and Weymann language). There's no "official" terminology here, but this is basically a quirky tenor guitar as it's a wood-topped banjo.

It's a beautifully-built instrument and even has a Virzi-like supplemental soundboard gadget under the hood. The top is extremely-lightly-braced and so it has a sweet, warm, but loud voice and definitely has some of that "banjo chop."

I love all of the odd design features of Iuccis -- this one has the bolted-to-the-rim neck that integrates the flange as a support mechanism as well. There's no dowel, and so because of that the whole instrument really needs its resonator attached to be rigid enough to hold-up well under tension, but once it's in place this is a nice, stable design.

It appears to be completely original save for one tuner (period replacement), new frets, and the star inlay in the rear of the resonator.

Work included a while-you-wait refret, some tweaks to the bridge. setup, a brace reglue to the end of a brace, and cleaning -- all of which I did. Ancel quickly made the replacement star inlay for the back (it was missing) and I fit it with some curious fill to try to give it a marbled effect. It worked but it's a little odd -- oh well! We were running out of time to make proper wood fill around the inlay. Next time!