Joseph Cilecek

[Jay VandeKopple]

Originally Posted by James Cilecek

Hello Jason,
Joseph was my father and he lived to be 88 years old....just passed away last year. As a teen, I assisted him with some of his bass repair work and did most of the bow rehairing. As I recall, he used a birch plywood back material on some instruments which is likely what is on your instrument. His career in stringed instrument repairing started in 1956 while he was a school teacher at Hastings. In 1966 he started working full time in instrument repair after a young bass player from the New York Philharmonic came to him with a complex job. After that his reputation spread and he had such clients as Julius Levine, June Rotenburg, Gary Carr, Frank Ioga, and most of the bassists of the New York Philharmonic. I'd be happy to answer any further questions about his work as I assisted him and knew a good deal about his repair approaches and techniques. My grandfather too helped out. My Dad discouraged me from going into the music business and thus I went to medical school, became an ER doc and play classical piano and cello as an amateur. Best Wishes, James.

Thanks for posting this, James. My condolences to you and your family.

I tried calling Joe's number again about a year ago but didn't get an answer or reply this time, so suspected this.

I also spoke at the time with John Beal, George Rubino, and Bob Daugherty, but we weren't sure what had happened. Each of us had enjoyed working with and learning from Joe - and I know there were many others who gained so much from knowing him.

Again, my condolences.
Jay