Cecilio Ebony Electric Silent Pearl White Cello 4/4

The cello works exactly as its supposed to. Assembly was easy, however as soon as I got the strings to pitch, two of them snapped. I would definitely advise getting better strings for this instrument if you plan to use it long term. The C and G string that are still part of the original set are very false.
The only real issue I found with this instrument is that when I received it, the bow had a really nasty crack at the tip. The port on the back of the instrument is also a little loose. I wish this instrument had a regular 1/4″ connector instead of the 3mm to 1/4″ cable that it does.

How does the spike come out??? It has a 2cm screw but does not seem to be adjustable!
The shiny look is awful

Let us hope it works anyway

I was a bit skeptical of this instrument given the price, but I was will to take the plunge. The strings are terrible – two snapped within one hour. And the bow is totally unusable – it appears to be plastic threads rather than horsehair. But the instrument itself is quite good. With new strings, it holds a tune perfectly well. It amplifies fine. I would buy this again.

I purchased this cello after looking at all the other electric cello models from cecelio on Amazon. It had the highest rating of them, so I figured it was at least going to be a decent model. If I could have given it a zero rating (simply for the sake of helping others avoid buying such a bad product), I would have. I want to preface this by stating that I am not a cellist, and I bought this as an alternative to a wooden cello due to some very nit-picky neighbors. However, I do play other instruments, and so I am familiar with some of the basic components of the instrument.

First of all, the cello came in a flimsy woven plastic bag with absolutely no padding. It’s as if someone sewed those reusable grocery bags together and fit it to the size of the cello. The body of the cello is strangely composed of what looks like solid wood, plywood, plastic, etc. all coated in a thick shimmering metallic red color. I would hardly call the color “mahogany,” more like the kind of red paint you would see on a chevy truck (I guess that might not be a con for some people).

The body had visible scratches that were simply covered with the shellac like everything else. The shellac was chipped in several areas revealing a whitish wood color underneath (kind of wonder what wood is so white…). Now for some of the deal breakers: the fingerboard was glued in place about 1.5-2mm away from the neck of the instrument. Now, again I’m not a cellist, and so I still don’t know if this is normal, but it did result in the entire neck rattling around when the instrument is played. I’m not sure that is supposed to happen. Also, the ‘A’ string snapped the minute I started turning the tuning pegs. Really? The string had to be incredibly poor quality as I barely tightened the string, let alone to the right key. The others tuned okay at least. I don’t have enough knowledge to know if the rosin was okay, or the horsehair on the bow. However, the bow was flimsy, and unevenly lacquered.

The electronic components were very poor. I didn’t expect a great instrument for the price. The yamaha electric cellos are in the thousands. However, the electronic components were like a toy! No matter how hard I tried to finagle the sound system, it wouldn’t get loud enough until I turned the system up to max. The volume on the cello MUST be set to max to even hear anything out of it. The strings are actually quite loud, and I couldn’t hear the sound from the speakers ever become louder than the strings, but another person near me assured me “something” was coming out of the speakers.

Overall, I suggest you save your money and put it toward a reliable and honest company (Yamaha makes some very nice electric cellos; I saw a couple at the Johnson String Instrument shop nearby). Outside of amazon, I looked this Cecelio company up and found cellists are bashing it on forums for many of the same reasons I have. They say that most of the instruments are unplayable. I don’t know enough to make that judgement, but I returned it having recognized what even a layman can as a very poor representation of an electric cello.

For the price I was really impressed by this cello. It’s very visually appealing and the tone is great! It has the ability to sound a lot like an acoustic which makes it a great practice instrument. Only complaints I have is that there was paint residue underneath the nut and that caused the A and D string to snap because of the sharp points. MAKE SURE TO GET RID OF THIS RESIDUE BEFORE TUNING and to use graphite on the nut and bridge to smoothen the surfaces. The strings that came with it weren’t great and I would recommend getting a set of strings and fine tuners and get rid of the ones that come with the cello. The reason I say get new fine tuners is because it seems like you have to pry open and clamp shut the tuners on the cello anytime you want to change a string and it gets really frustrating. I also wasn’t a fan with the rough ridges on the fine tuners and how hard they were to turn. But otherwise it’s a great instrument and I highly recommend this if you’re on a budget!