Ben Venuti - Posted - 01/28/2012:  11:40:53

The Given's Ode:
The Ode mandolins were manufactured in Nashville when Tut Taylor,Bob Givens and I think Randy Wood took over the Grammer Guitar factory after Ampeg messed up the deal and decided after getting into the guitar business to get out of the guitar business. The Odes were distributed by Baldwin and they were a pretty good mandolin considering that they were made to fill in the gap the Gibson created by being in their "dark" days. They were cheap kinda and a good deal for the money considering that you could hardly get a new mandolin at that time for any money. That mandolin has been on ebay at that exact price for ages ---like pushing two years. Obviously the seller thinks it's worth that but no one else does. I'd want to play it but it could very well be worth $1500 but only playing it could tell. The "Givens" engraved tailpiece cover is very cool and I never saw that on any other Ode.

The Givens' Legacy:
I've met this guy many years ago. Steve Weill, that is who made that mandolin ---Steve Weill worked for Bob Givens in Idaho for a long time and I believe was the only other guy in Bob's shop. Bob thought highly of Steve and they built many mandolins together before Bob died. After his death Steve made a deal to produce the mandolins that they were making with the consent of the Givens family. So it is not in fact an actual Givens it's,I guess you would call it, a reproduction. But with the actual gigs and such that produced Bob's mandolins. I've played some of Steve's mandolins and they are really nice and I have had an A6 Legacy model and a A6 Givens (mine) side by side and they were identical in every way. For the quality I think the Weill made mandolins are still (though he raised his prices of late) a very good deal. It seems Steve Weill has also inherited something else from Bob Givens---he doesn't care too much about money.