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Do-It-Yourself. A number of small U.S. makers, working in lofts, studios and stables, lovingly turn out instruments finer than anything Europe has to offer. They are split into two mildly hostile factions: those who stick to wooden frames and those who experiment with metal. William Dowd and Frank Hubbard, both of Boston, who are wood men, plead that metal introduces a historically inaccurate effect. Nevertheless, both are admirers of Manhattan's Frank Rutkowski, 27, who uses aluminum for his frames on the grounds that metal contracts and expands less (a wooden-frame harpsichord must be tuned virtually every time it is played and whenever it is moved).
Leader of the metal faction is John Challis, pioneer U.S. manufacturer of harpsichords, who learned his trade back in the '20s from the late famed English Instrument Maker Arnold Dolmetsch. In a shop at the rear of his huge, century-old brick house in Detroit, Challis constructs about twelve harpsichords a year (last week he was working on his 230th), grosses $30,000. A Challis harpsichord costs anywhere from $900 to $5,800, is made of walnut and modern materials like Bakelite, aluminum and plastic.
In a run-down loft in Manhattan's Greenwich Village, an ex-child psychologist named Wallace Zuckermann turns out the U.S.'s only mass-produced harpsichord, an instrument that sells briskly for $750, but is derided by professionals. Last spring, Zuckermann went a step further: for a mere $150, his clients can now buy the Zuckermann Do-It-Yourself Harpsichord Kit, complete with diagrams, strings, jacks and Ivaloid plastic keys.