Eric Gomance of Hot Springs was only 4 years old when his grandfather Johnnie gifted him his old violins.
“It wasn’t until I was in college did my mom give me the violins,” Gomance said. “She said, ‘These were your granddad’s, and you should have them.’”
It wasn’t until Gomance was 21 that he decided to try to fix them.
“I started playing the violin because it was his instrument and he had played it,” Gomance said. “I tried to learn some folk songs, but as opposed to other instruments, it is difficult to get started.
“But once you get started, it gets a little easier. The violin has a steep learning curve.”
Later, Gomance joined the Cedar Grove Bluegrass Band and started playing regularly with them.
“I asked a bandmate, ‘If I wanted to get these violins fixed, where do I need to go?’” Gomance said. “‘Take them to Phil Wingfield.’”
Gomance said he drove to Gurdon to meet Wingfield at his shop.
“He showed me around, and he diagnosed the problems that were wrong with my granddad’s violins,” Gomance said. “After that, I asked him if he would teach me how to build a fiddle.
“He’s been teaching me ever since.”
That was almost a year ago.
“When he wanted to build a fiddle, I thought it was a good idea,” Wingfield said, “because I would get to pass it along to somebody, especially somebody as young as he is.
“He has many years ahead and will only learn to improve and get better.”
The wood of the violins that belonged to Johnnie have warped as a result of the tensions of the strings.
“They needed to be repaired badly; that’s when I sought Phil out,” Gomance said.
But Gomance is in no rush to repair the violins, either.
“I think by the end of the process, I should be able to repair them myself, but it is more about the process than the end result,” he said.
“I enjoy hanging out with Phil more than the means of repairing the violins.”
Wingfield said Gomance has patience and has a good eye for designing the silhouette.
“He is a hard worker,” Wingfield said. “It is not easy; you have to work at it.”
Gomance, who also plays the trumpet and the guitar, has put in more than 200 hours but is only about halfway through building his first violin.
“We were set back on this on the account of my wife and her health problems,” Wingfield, 88, said. “She had a heart attack and had to have a leg amputated due to her diabetes.
“It has been a long drawn-out illness, and we have spent a lot of time in and out of the hospital, so it set us back on the work a little bit.
“We just do it when we have the hours to do it.”
Wingfield has been married to his wife, Betty, for 64 years.
“I came in with a very rudimentary knowledge of woodworking,” Gomance said. “But Phil has taught me everything, from how to properly use a saw to how to raise a family.
“Phil has the best advice and utilizes the best sayings.”
One of Wingfield’s favorite sayings is “Kentucky windage,” which usually refers to an adjustment made by a shooter to correct for wind.
“Which basically means, you are going to wing it …,” Gomance said. “It is very rare that it comes into violin making, but when it does, we enjoy the liberties of being artistic and creative.”
Wingfield, who has been building violins as a hobby since 1963, said Gomance is his second apprentice.
“The other fellow was a guy from Texas,” Wingfield said, “but when he started, he was somewhere around 75 years old.
“It took us about eight weeks to [basically] build the violin, and he finished it himself later.”
Wingfield learned to build violins from a man named W.A. Spraggin in Texas.
“Any chance I got, I would go into his shop and play one of his handmade fiddles,” Wingfield said. “He wanted to sell me one, but I couldn’t afford it.”
Wingfield said the very first violin he made, he threw in the trash.
“Some I have given away, and over the years, I have scattered them around pretty well,” Wingfield said. “I’ve sold to people in Idaho, south Texas and some in Oklahoma.
“There are not all that many.”
Wingfield and Gomance not only hand-make the violins, but also the tools used to build them.
“We are following tried-and-true methods …,” Wingfield said. “It is a fine hobby. You can come in here and lose yourself.
“The day will get away from you before you want it to.”
Wingfield said that in the year he has spent with Gomance, he has seen a lot of progress.
“In the way he handle tools and how to hold them to exert physical pressure,” Wingfield said. “He has an eye for detail and the patience to hang with it.”
Gomance graduated from Fountain Lake High School in 2010 and from Henderson State University in Arkadelphia in 2014. He earned a bachelor’s degree in music education and a master’s degree in clinical mental health therapy in 2017 from Henderson State.
He now works as a mental health care professional for Preferred Family Health Care in Hot Springs.
“Just from having been in the education system, the creativity that it takes to play music is the same type of creativity that it takes to inspire kids in a lot of ways,” Gomance said. “Where the two bridge, I don’t know.”
Gomance has been married to Kayla since 2015. She is a state-park interpreter for Lake Ouachita State Park.
“Phil is an excellent guy, one of the best I know,”
Gomance said. “He is genuine, hardworking and cares about his family.
“It means a lot for him to take the time to teach me.”
Staff writer Sam Pierce can be reached at (501) 244-4314 or spierce@arkansasonline.com.