Wayne Gaydos

What started as a career in furniture woodworking has developed into a combination of two art forms for Wayne Gaydos — woodworking and music.

Wayne has created musical instruments out of various Indiana hardwoods for many years. He discovered his true calling when his children voiced their interest in playing an array of stringed instruments. His background in woodworking gave Wayne the foundation and experience to craft wooden dulcimers, mandolins, psalteries and harps.

It’s the sounds the instruments make, though, that inspire Wayne to create.

“Taking rough wood and crafting it into something that sounds wonderful and then watching and listening to someone play it inspires me,” he says. “There is potential in each piece of wood to create a sweet sound, and that surprise only comes out in the finished instrument.”

Each of the instruments created at his From The Woods studio in Randolph County is done using time-honored techniques. His work is authentic and original as Wayne selects the wood, designs the soundboards, and styles each instrument and sound holes. In his hands, every instrument is unique.

Wayne applied to become an Indiana Artisan because he saw that step as a way to recognize instrument-making as a traditional art and craft.

“The artisans who make folk instruments are vanishing due to competition from foreign companies that build them and the economics of being a small, one-at-a-time builder,” Wayne says. “Hopefully, my art and craft will inspire others to become builders of musical instruments and save this valuable craft.”