By Brian Fidelman 

New York Times

• Sept. 25, 2005

HUNTINGTON - GUITAR music sometimes sounds as if it came off an assembly line, efficient and adequate but hardly a distinctive work of art.

The same can be said of the instrument itself. But just off Route 110 in Huntington there is a guitar maker who is nowhere near the factory.

Joseph Jesselli, 56, starts with fine seasoned wood, and finishes -- countless details later -- with pieces of functional art, mostly electric guitars, that have won customers ranging from obscure collectors to Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones.

Electric guitars did not hit their stride until the 1950's, but to hear Mr. Jesselli talk, and to see his work, is to be taken back earlier in the 20th century. He draws his inspiration from Art Deco and Art Nouveau, from gun and furniture makers and from what he believes is a dying group: skilled artisans who served true apprenticeships and know how to use their hands.

"To me, an artisan has to chop stuff, really do a good job, like a woodcarver," Mr. Jesselli said at his studio. "A guy who inlays, a guy who gilds, a guy who finishes. These take lifetimes to really master these things."

His obsessive attention to detail shapes every part of his process, from start ("I don't want to use a piece of wood unless I've had it 10 years") to finish ("a finisher is not just a guy who schlops paint on a piece of furniture -- it's a really very intense thing to do"). As a final touch, he even makes leather and oak cases with tools and straps to match that guitar.

Mr. Jesselli, who grew up in Huntington, moved back here this year after spending 18 years in West Virginia honing his craft, makes just a handful of guitars a year, taking five to six months for each one. He doesn't like talking about prices, but said they start at $18,000 to $20,000.

Alan Rogan, who is the Who's longtime guitar technician, bought one of Mr. Jesselli's guitars a few months ago. "Best guitars ever made," Mr. Rogan said in a telephone interview from England. "There are the guitars we all dreamed about growing up, and then there's Jesselli. And as cool as they look, they sound even better. With the time and money he puts into them, how does he make a penny?"

Mr. Jesselli served two apprenticeships, first making frames for paintings and mirrors with Marcos Baiter, a Huntington woodcarver. "Woodcarving, gilding, nothing directly to do with the guitar," Mr. Jesselli said, "but that, in my opinion, is way more important."

He second apprenticeship was with one of the most famous names in guitar making: James L. D'Aquisto of Huntington, who died in 1995.

"I wanted to learn how to make guitars, and he was the best," Mr. Jesselli said. But after six or seven years with Mr. D'Aquisto, he said, he felt constricted and wanted to experiment.

"Jimmy was great to me -- he was there for me," Mr. Jesselli said. "But there were certain rules and regulations which stemmed from his personality. I was into art, designing, carving things, and that was not what he wanted."

From carving the wood to inlaying an ebony fret board with pearl to casting the metal parts, each step of making a guitar requires a special skill. Mr. Jesselli does it himself, in painstaking detail.

"Like this," he said, pointing with pride to a finished guitar. "I got into ormolu casting, gold leafing and patinas."

Mr. Jesselli speaks passionately about the wood he uses, which he has collected since the 70's: Cuban mahogany, Brazilian rosewood, ebony and Circassian walnut, which he called the "filet mignon of the tree." 

Mr. Jesselli carves away, working on five to seven guitars at a time, but it is not until the neck is glued to the body that a guitar is born. 

"It's almost like that genetic thing when the sperm fertilize the egg," he said. "When that neck goes on, bam!"

The guitar then has its own personality, Mr. Jesselli said, a reflection of the artist who made it.

"A lot of people design their guitar for a market niche -- Les Pauls do this and Fenders do that," he said. "Well, I don't do that. I make my guitars for me, so that people who are like-minded, they're going to die for these guitars."

There is nothing wrong with factory guitars, Mr. Jesselli said, some of which in his view are better than many custom-made guitars. He also believes that a guitar should not be expensive just because it's old or rare. It must have intrinsic value, he says; it must have a soul.

"Regardless of whether you like the style, these are really beautiful guitars," Mr. Jesselli said. "They're not a regular guitar that was made beautiful, they were conceived that way. There was no applied art. And it's a dream."