Posted on March 3, 2024May 8, 2025 by Dale Phillips Where Are They Now? Where Are They Now? by Tim Olsen Originally published in American Lutherie #2, 1985 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie, Volume One, 2000 See also, The Business of Lutherie, 1980 by Richard Bruné, George Gruhn, Steve Klein, Max Krimmel, and Robert Lundberg The Business of Lutherie, 1984 by Ted Davis, Steve Grimes, Bob Meltz, and Matt Umanov Five years ago, the Guild presented its first Business of Lutherie seminar at our 1980 Convention/Exhibition in San Francisco. I recently contacted the five panelists to see how lutherie has treated them in the interim. I found that times have changed, and that the panelists have changed as well. Vintage and fine guitar dealer George Gruhn told of a wildly fluctuating and vastly changed market, and pinpoints late 1981 as the sudden end of the relatively good market conditions which prevailed throughout the seventies. At that time, the rise in value of the U.S. dollar shut off the lucrative export market, which had previously accounted for 40% of American-made guitars. The dismal conditions of 1982 and 1983 brought Gruhn Guitars to the brink of bankruptcy, and only in 1984 was George able to “climb out of the ooze onto dry land.” Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on March 2, 2024May 15, 2025 by Dale Phillips Guilds of the Middle Ages Guilds of the Middle Ages by Gregory Smith Originally published in Guild of American Luthiers Quarterly, Volume 9, #4, 1981 The Guilds of the Middle Ages in western Europe were the outgrowth of religious, economic, political, social and legal needs of the working class people of the period. The collective power and influence of a large group of craftsmen or businessmen could wield enough force to effectively combat the oppression of the feudal lords. The guilds influenced them in various ways ranging from petitioning their grievances, leading revolts against the nobles in the case of the Flemish weaving guilds, or the wealthier guilds simply paid the lords to issue ordinances that were advantageous to their trade. Guilds were established so the workers could gain control of the different trades and professions by setting standards of workmanship and prices of goods and through prohibiting poorly trained workmen from carrying on a trade, and by setting up a hierarchy of status within the system. They even had pension funds and gave money to journeymen and masters that were ill. In London, a guild came into existence by an ordinance of the mayor and aldermen of the city which granted them the power to control their trade. This was usually followed by a Royal Charter of Incorporation granted by the king.1 Throughout most of Europe, guilds were chartered and named either according to the materials used by the craftsman or by the item produced. The Joiners, who were incorporated in England in 1307, joined wood together and this group included cabinetmakers, makers of virginals, harpsichords and other wooden instruments such as lutes and viols. The Brasiers and Stringers were granted a charter in 1416. The Brasiers of brass workers made various items including trumpets and other brass instruments. The Stringers made strings for archery bows and it seems likely that they also made gut strings required by the many types of stringed instruments of the Renaissance. In 1603, the king granted a charter to the Musicians and also to the Turners, who turned wooden articles, including recorders and other wind instruments on their lathes. The instrument makers, or luthiers, of France were united into one guild in 1599 by a statute issued by Henry IV. Before that time they were ordinarily grouped by the materials with which they worked. The trumpet makers around 1300, for example, were members of the iron and copper pot makers.2 As early as 1270 a small guild of wire drawers existed in Paris.3 Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on October 31, 2022May 19, 2025 by Dale Phillips Attic Strads, and Why What’s Worth Something Is Worth What It’s Worth Attic Strads, and Why What’s Worth Something Is Worth What It’s Worth by Michael Darnton Originally published in American Lutherie #25, 1991 and Big Red Book of American, Volume Three, 2004 One of the most common myths of violin fanciers is the existence of the attic Strad. The chances of finding a valuable violin at a garage sale are zip (or less). In recent years the number of Strads and Guarneris discovered in this world in this way can be counted on about three fingers, and they haven’t been found in attics in Kansas. Check out places like ancient European monasteries and the country homes of nobility if you want to increase your chances of finding something good. In spite of this, every large shop has several people a week coming in with a really bad violin they have been saving as a way to finance their retirement. In addition, hundreds of amateur collectors have instruments they believe are valuable Italians, which are “prevented from receiving their rightful recognition” by owners of the big shops who either “don’t want to admit that someone else has something good” or “don’t know what they’re talking about.” They are right; someone does not know what they are talking about. It isn’t the big shop owner. In the early part of this century and the end of the last, thousands of cheap factory violins were imported into this country from Germany and Czechoslovakia. Although some of these look and sound quite nice and are made of beautiful wood, they are still just factory fiddles. Since much of a violin’s value derives from factors other than the quality of the wood and the quantity of sandpaper used in its construction, like it or not those factors don’t mean much in assessing the value of an instrument. Certainly no one would appraise a painting based on the cost of the paint and the quality of the canvas, yet many amateur violin collectors use that type of criterion for evaluating their finds. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on August 1, 2022May 19, 2025 by Dale Phillips On Becoming a Successful Luthier On Becoming a Successful Luthier by R.E. Bruné Originally published in Guild of American Luthiers Newsletter Volume 2 #6, 1974 A question I am often asked by visitors to my shop and other luthiers, is, “are you making it?” as if to say “anyone who looks like he’s having such a good time doesn’t deserve to make money too.” Well, I am happy to report that yes, I’m “making” it. To be judged a successful luthier, I think it is really necessary to examine exactly what “Success” is, especially in terms of today’s somewhat unstable economic climate. Unfortunately, for many of this country’s working people, the only tangible measure of success is the monthly bank statement. The balance of the account has become the end in itself, and the product be damned. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 8, 2022May 12, 2025 by Dale Phillips Meet the Maker: Guy Rabut Meet the Maker: Guy Rabut by Tim Olsen Originally published in American Lutherie #32, 1992 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 On a recent trip to New York, I had the good fortune to visit Guy Rabut in his uptown Manhattan apartment above a small grocery store. We sat in his tiny shop, which was piled high with cardboard boxes in anticipation of Guy’s imminent move into a freshly renovated space in Carnegie Hall. He made the move in October, and now shares this classy address with two violin dealers, Charles Rudig and Fred Oster, and Michael Yeats, a bow maker. Artifacts of wide-ranging artistic sensitivities surrounded us, including Northwest coastal Indian carvings which Guy made during a summer seminar with renowned artist Bill Reed; his intriguing logo in which the proper curves of a violin appear in a cubist jumble; a glass case holding a few of his beautiful finished fiddles; and a pine mock-up of a banjo he plans to build someday. Guy Rabut is one of the Guild’s most faithful members. The May ’74 issue of the GAL Newsletter listed him as a new member, and he hasn’t missed a day since. He is also a member of the American Federation of Violin and Bow Makers. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
