Leedy Solotone Style C Tenor Banjo
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Very rarely do I come across a vintage Leedy tenor banjo especially in excellent condition. This tenor banjo comes from the collection of Joseph Sobell from Tenessee, musician, poet, story teller and quite a legend. Anyhow its good to drop a name! I purchased the banjo from him some months back as he is down sizing some of his collection of instruments,so I was fortunate to purchase the Leedy Solotone. Probably not a banjo brand you are familiar with but they are very much under rated and stand long side all of the vintage branded banjos from the 1920’s i.e. Paramount, Bacon & Day, Gibson, Majestic. but they look and sound amazing.
Banjo details
Gold plated engraved metal-clad wood rim with top tension adjustment hoop. This type of design allows easy head tension adjustment. The resonator has a celluloid back covering with white inlaid design and gold plated metal flange. The inner part of the resonator is fitted with the patented cone to reflect the sound outwards, maybe this is how they give their unique sound. There are 28 hooks & brackets, Kershner tail piece and custom made Farquhar bridge.
The 5 piece neck is constructed from tiger maple sandwiched with green pear wood either side of the ebony centre, the side walls are bound with diamond shaped marquetry wood. There is a nice heel carving in the Style C model and a neck angle ajustment in the heel cap which works well. The neck has a scale length of 22-3/4″ is perfectly straight and shows little wear as does the 19 frets which are in great condition. The ebony fret board is beautifully inlaid with floral design pearl position markers. Bone nut and pearl inlay head stock bearing the brand name ‘Leedy Solotone’. Gold plated Grover tuners in perfect working order. The banjo plays very easily with low action up the fretboard and is in perfect tonal tune. It comes either with its original vintage brown leatherette case or with the quality ruby fur lined hard case shown in the pictures.
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