Heavenly harps
Stoney End makes, sells musical instruments internationally
By Ben Sonnek
STAFF WRITER
There is good reason why the harp has been considered the standard instrument of heaven. Stoney End, tucked in the countryside near Red Wing, is eager to give people the means to make divine music here on earth with their range of handmade harps that have been sought after around the globe.
“I don’t have a musical background; I have a woodworking background,” said Gary Stone, founder and co-owner of Stoney End. “I don’t make the music. I make the tools.”
Gary grew up in southeastern Minnesota, where the family’s roots in the land go back to the 1890s. His grandfather, Walter Stone, had a turning lathe which captured his interest, and Gary would go on to do woodworking himself. After college, he worked for Here Inc. in the West Bank neighborhood in Minneapolis in the late 1960s. The shop mainly made dulcimers and dulcimer kits, which were in high demand at the time.
“Here Inc. had a harp plan; it wasn’t a very good plan, but it had the core of some really good ideas, and so we started making harps,” Gary said. “I bought the plans and what the business consisted of, which was dulcimer kits. Then, we made some harp kits in the ‘80s.”
When the kit industry started dying out, Gary moved the company into selling finished instruments and establishing a dealer network of music stores to sell their harps. He also added more of his own harp designs to the available products, naming them in honor of female friends and family. The business also used to sell music books, but the emergence of large, online retailors caused that side of the business to phase out.
Now, Stoney End sells their harps and other products directly from the barn Gary and his wife and Stoney End co-owner, Eve, bought near Red Wing in 2001.
“Barns like this, big ol’ hip-roofed barns, are not much use in modern agricultural practices,” Gary said. “We wanted to have an actual retail outlet; we were making (harps) in a big building behind the house way out in the country where no one could find us.”
Part of Stoney End’s expansion has included a partnership with Hobgoblin Music in England. The store in the Stoney End barn has the Hobgoblin Music name, and along with the harps, Stoney End sells a variety of musical instruments such as traditional Irish whistles and drums, bouzoukis, octave mandolas, banjos, mandolins, concertinas and more.
The Stones remodeled the barn to have three levels: The top floor is an event center, the middle floor is the Hobgoblin Music store and the bottom floor is the Stoney End workshop.
Stoney End does not make orchestra harps — tall, double-action harps with about 46-48 strings and pedal controls to change keys. Instead, they make the traditional lever harps, which can be lap or floor harps and vary from smaller 22-string models up to 36 strings.
“On a lever harp, you have a separate mechanism on each string,” Gary said.
“If you want to change your Cs to C-sharps, you have to change all four of your Cs by lifting a little cam on each string.”
Harps are a versatile instrument that can play a wide range of musical genres, including jazz and rock-and-roll.
“We sold a harp to a customer who plays harp for Leonard Cohen in all his concerts,” Gary said. “Of course, the harp has been popular for Irish, Scottish and Welsh music for many years. …We’ve developed a number of different harps — particularly, lately, the double-strung harp, which has two rows of strings on it, and that’s become pretty popular.”
Stoney End uses mostly high-grade walnut and cherry wood for their harps, as well as some maple, all sourced from the Midwest. The harp soundboards are made from aircraft-grade plywood for its strength, resonance and low weight.
Traditionally, European harps have strings made from animal guts or sinew, which made for long, low-tension strings; in the Celtic tradition, strings were made from metals like brass, steel or other alloys with gold and silver. Nowadays, harp strings — including the ones in Stoney End harps — are mostly nylon, although carbon fiber strings are coming into the mainstream as well.
“The nylon is a stiff nylon,” Gary said. “It’s not a fishline-type nylon, which never stops stretching; this is tempered nylon, which has uses in the bristle brush industry. … Longer strings have a nylon core and a wrapping.”
Once all the parts are made, it takes about a day to put a harp together, plus another half-day to sand it. The harp then needs a month of tuning after its finish and strings are added. Then, when the level mechanisms are added, it is ready for the customer.
Along with the U.S. and England, Stoney End has sold harps in Canada, Norway, Japan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Australia, Israel, South Africa and all over Europe.
In Gary’s opinion, the harps that are being made today, including the ones made by Stoney End’s competitors, are the best they have ever been.
“From when we started out 40 years (ago), the whole industry is much higher quality,” he said. “The harps available at Here Inc. when we first started would be completely unacceptable in the market today.”
Whenever Gary gets up in the morning, he looks forward to all the activity around harp making, especially the interactions with visitors and customers. For him, selling an instrument is giving the buyer a gateway to a fuller musical experience.
“Nowadays, everything is prepackaged,” Gary said. “You don’t even have to put your record on the record player, move the arm and put it down; it all comes prepackaged on your phone, and it’s so highly processed and perfected. Our idea (is) that people can make music themselves. It can be a great experience, even if they’re not doing it perfectly. … We’re making the tools (and) providing people with the experience of making music themselves, which is rewarding for us here.”
By Ben Sonnek
STAFF WRITER
There is good reason why the harp has been considered the standard instrument of heaven. Stoney End, tucked in the countryside near Red Wing, is eager to give people the means to make divine music here on earth with their range of handmade harps that have been sought after around the globe.
“I don’t have a musical background; I have a woodworking background,” said Gary Stone, founder and co-owner of Stoney End. “I don’t make the music. I make the tools.”
Gary grew up in southeastern Minnesota, where the family’s roots in the land go back to the 1890s. His grandfather, Walter Stone, had a turning lathe which captured his interest, and Gary would go on to do woodworking himself. After college, he worked for Here Inc. in the West Bank neighborhood in Minneapolis in the late 1960s. The shop mainly made dulcimers and dulcimer kits, which were in high demand at the time.
“Here Inc. had a harp plan; it wasn’t a very good plan, but it had the core of some really good ideas, and so we started making harps,” Gary said. “I bought the plans and what the business consisted of, which was dulcimer kits. Then, we made some harp kits in the ‘80s.”
When the kit industry started dying out, Gary moved the company into selling finished instruments and establishing a dealer network of music stores to sell their harps. He also added more of his own harp designs to the available products, naming them in honor of female friends and family. The business also used to sell music books, but the emergence of large, online retailors caused that side of the business to phase out.
Now, Stoney End sells their harps and other products directly from the barn Gary and his wife and Stoney End co-owner, Eve, bought near Red Wing in 2001.
“Barns like this, big ol’ hip-roofed barns, are not much use in modern agricultural practices,” Gary said. “We wanted to have an actual retail outlet; we were making (harps) in a big building behind the house way out in the country where no one could find us.”
Part of Stoney End’s expansion has included a partnership with Hobgoblin Music in England. The store in the Stoney End barn has the Hobgoblin Music name, and along with the harps, Stoney End sells a variety of musical instruments such as traditional Irish whistles and drums, bouzoukis, octave mandolas, banjos, mandolins, concertinas and more.
The Stones remodeled the barn to have three levels: The top floor is an event center, the middle floor is the Hobgoblin Music store and the bottom floor is the Stoney End workshop.
Stoney End does not make orchestra harps — tall, double-action harps with about 46-48 strings and pedal controls to change keys. Instead, they make the traditional lever harps, which can be lap or floor harps and vary from smaller 22-string models up to 36 strings.
“On a lever harp, you have a separate mechanism on each string,” Gary said.
“If you want to change your Cs to C-sharps, you have to change all four of your Cs by lifting a little cam on each string.”
Harps are a versatile instrument that can play a wide range of musical genres, including jazz and rock-and-roll.
“We sold a harp to a customer who plays harp for Leonard Cohen in all his concerts,” Gary said. “Of course, the harp has been popular for Irish, Scottish and Welsh music for many years. …We’ve developed a number of different harps — particularly, lately, the double-strung harp, which has two rows of strings on it, and that’s become pretty popular.”
Stoney End uses mostly high-grade walnut and cherry wood for their harps, as well as some maple, all sourced from the Midwest. The harp soundboards are made from aircraft-grade plywood for its strength, resonance and low weight.
Traditionally, European harps have strings made from animal guts or sinew, which made for long, low-tension strings; in the Celtic tradition, strings were made from metals like brass, steel or other alloys with gold and silver. Nowadays, harp strings — including the ones in Stoney End harps — are mostly nylon, although carbon fiber strings are coming into the mainstream as well.
“The nylon is a stiff nylon,” Gary said. “It’s not a fishline-type nylon, which never stops stretching; this is tempered nylon, which has uses in the bristle brush industry. … Longer strings have a nylon core and a wrapping.”
Once all the parts are made, it takes about a day to put a harp together, plus another half-day to sand it. The harp then needs a month of tuning after its finish and strings are added. Then, when the level mechanisms are added, it is ready for the customer.
Along with the U.S. and England, Stoney End has sold harps in Canada, Norway, Japan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Australia, Israel, South Africa and all over Europe.
In Gary’s opinion, the harps that are being made today, including the ones made by Stoney End’s competitors, are the best they have ever been.
“From when we started out 40 years (ago), the whole industry is much higher quality,” he said. “The harps available at Here Inc. when we first started would be completely unacceptable in the market today.”
Whenever Gary gets up in the morning, he looks forward to all the activity around harp making, especially the interactions with visitors and customers. For him, selling an instrument is giving the buyer a gateway to a fuller musical experience.
“Nowadays, everything is prepackaged,” Gary said. “You don’t even have to put your record on the record player, move the arm and put it down; it all comes prepackaged on your phone, and it’s so highly processed and perfected. Our idea (is) that people can make music themselves. It can be a great experience, even if they’re not doing it perfectly. … We’re making the tools (and) providing people with the experience of making music themselves, which is rewarding for us here.”
