Mine was all soldered up on a 'prototype pcb' - the type with just pads around the holes. I tried the breadboard approach but 8x8 LEDs and a breadboard was a bit hard for me to handle. It is actually very easy to build one up it up, but the number of solder joints meant there were bound to be some problems.
I have read before that on this forum some people have problems with the 7219 on breadboards because the high frequency used to update the display causes weird effects on the type of 'mechanical' electrical (if that makes sense) joints used.