Two 5-string kantele replicas á la Billy Horne

Blog

March 30, 2018

Billy (aka Ivan Leslie) Horne is a very patient man. It must be a year ago (or 2?.. what -3?!! ..Ok, now I’m blushing..) when he gave me two 5-string kantele replicas for experimenting. The other has bronze strings and the other steel strings. Then somehow they were hidden behind the ever growing mountain of unfinished work until this spring they appeared like a magic mystery in front of my eyes.

Well – the result of a couple of days of experimentation is here.

For my shame to be complete I couldn’t remember where the origin of these replicas was from. Luckily it was found online: Suomen museot on-line . The original kantele is from the rural municipality of Rovaniemi (in northern Finland) and belongs nowadays to the collection of the National Museum of Finland. The year 1830 is carved on the short side of the instrument.

Inside of these replicas you can find the name of the builder (Ivan Leslie Horne), the number of the instrument and the year when it was made (2014). The same year is also carved on the long side of the steel string replica. The original instrument has lost its original strings but with great probability they have been either bronze or brass in the 1830’s.

The tuning of the two in the video are: B3, C#4, D#4, E4, F#4 (the bronze string kantele) and D#4, E4, F#4, G#4, A#4 (the steel string kantele). The diameter of the bronze strings is 0,40 mm and of the steel strings 0,35 mm.

You can find Billy Horne aka Ivan Leslie Horne in Facebook.

Billy Horn_replika 2014 Rovaniemen mlk K104601_vaskikielinen

Billy Horn_replika 2014 Rovaniemen mlk K104601_vaskikielinen2

Billy Horn_replika 2014 Rovaniemen mlk K104601_vaskikielinen3

Billy Horn_replika 2014 Rovaniemen mlk K104601_teräskielinen

Billy Horn_replika 2014 Rovaniemen mlk K104601_teräskielinen2

Billy Horn_replika 2014 Rovaniemen mlk K104601_teräskielinen3