Posted on July 8, 2026July 8, 2026 by Dale Phillips Review: Vincente Arias (1833-1914) The Forgotten Luthier Review: Vincente Arias (1833-1914) The Forgotten Luthier by Kevin Aram Originally published in American Lutherie #144, 2021 Vicente Arias (1833-1914), The Forgotten Luthier Alberto Martinez, Clémentine Jouffroy, Editors (many other contributors) ISBN 979-1090267-56-5 Camino Verde, Paris France, 2021 https://caminoverde.com I first became aware of Vicente Arias in 1978 when I bought a copy of the book Guitars: From the Renaissance to Rock by Tom and Mary Anne Evans. In the section entitled “The Modern Classical Guitar,” there is a listing for an Arias guitar from 1874. The entry has a short description of the guitar together with the dimensions, three photographs, and the information that he lived and worked in the town of Ciudad Real which is in the Provence of La Mancha in Spain. Fast forward to 1984 when my wife and I spent a month driving around Central, Southern, and Eastern Spain. As a part of this holiday we decided to follow the journey taken by Don Quixote in the famous book, and so, tourist brochure in hand, we visited and stayed in a number of towns in La Mancha including Ciudad Real. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 2, 2026July 2, 2026 by Dale Phillips Meet the Maker: Antonio Marin Meet the Maker: Antonio Marin by Federico Sheppard Originally published in American Lutherie #117, 2014 The feet of the finest horse in Spain carefully worked their way over the mosaic of white and black stones, loping upward to the crest of the hill, where stood perhaps the most magnificent palace on earth. The rider, dressed in an elaborate Moorish caftan dress, her husband at her side, had just recently met with an odd Italian sailor who’s spying had helped in the conquest, and led to the day referred to at the time as, “The most distinguished and blessed day there had ever been in Spain.” On the other side of the hill, down narrow cobbled streets, the treasures of the former resident of the palace had been quietly removed at daybreak. A lone bird, high in his perch in a pomegranate tree, could have looked down upon that scene and remarked on the pattern of those white and black paving stones snaking up the hill, a mosaic of roses bordered by the most delicate herringbone along the edges of the road. The day was early January 1492; the city, Granada; the lady, Queen Isabella. She and her husband Fernando, “appeared more than mortal, as if sent by Heaven for the salvation of Spain.” The Italian, looked upon as something of a bad penny, was Christopher Columbus. For many, 1492 will be remembered more for the capture of Granada than for the discovery of the New World. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on June 22, 2026June 22, 2026 by Dale Phillips Meet the Maker: Géza Burghardt Meet the Maker: Géza Burghardt by Cindy Burton Originally published in American Lutherie #61, 2000 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Six, 2013 I met Géza and his wife and business partner, Tini, at the 1998 GAL Convention in Tacoma. I’d been hearing about him for several years and was really looking forward to our chat. Three hours whizzed by as Géza told his remarkable story, a true immigrant success story. He, Tini, and their young daughter Eszter arrived in Vancouver, B.C. in 1988 with little more than the shirts on their backs. They spoke very little English. Twelve years later they have a thriving lutherie business, a beautiful shop, and a comfortable life. What follows is Géza’s story in his own words. I was fourteen years old when I became an apprentice in a special woodworking school in Hungary for three years to become a pattern maker. This is an extremely complicated job requiring great precision. We were taught to do everything by hand. We were not allowed to use any power machines, not even a grinder to grind the chisels. After you were done with a job it was sent to a special room for checking. There was no tolerance — not even a tenth of a millimeter. They’d send it back and you’d have to fix it, and your salary went down. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on June 12, 2026June 12, 2026 by Dale Phillips Let’s Catch Up With Graham Caldersmith Let's Catch Up With Graham Caldersmith by Juan Oscar Azaret Originally published in American Lutherie #132, 2017 Hop on a plane in Boston. Fly twenty-seven hours to Sydney, then connect on a prop plane to Port Macquarie on the coast of New South Wales. Rent a car (no, the steering wheel is not on that side, dummy), and drive 60KM southwest. (Stay to the left, the left, the LEFT!) Oops, here comes a traffic circle — drive around clockwise, cars on your right have the right of way, remember to exit left, and stay left. Why is that left wheel always grabbing the shoulder... where the heck is it, anyway? Now out of the city (whew!) and on beautiful Australian farmland — rolling green hills in the mild August winter. Past the logging town of Wauchope and the hamlet of Byabarra. The road narrows to a winding switchback climb up the steep slopes of Bago Bluff, and finally we find ourselves on a high plateau of rich farmland in the town of Comboyne, NSW, population two hundred. Comboyne is the home of luthier Graham Caldersmith and his partner Angela MacPherson (Photo 1). On a recent trip to visit our son in Australia, I took the time to spend a delightful day with Graham and Angela in their enchanting home/workshop/tea house where I learned much about lutherie and acoustics, and enjoyed their wonderful hospitality. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on June 9, 2026June 9, 2026 by Dale Phillips Construction Methods of Early Spanish Guitarreros Construction Methods of Early Spanish Guitarreros by James Westbrook Originally published in American Lutherie #118, 2014 Imagine London in the early-to-mid 19th century, a vibrant creative center, especially for the manufacture of fine musical instruments. Makers from France and further afield settled here and flourished. I’ve spent much of the last twenty-two years studying many of the relics of this time, some of them playable, and piecing together their history, and hopefully contributing insights that others will find useful and will build upon as they conduct and publish their own research or construct their own guitars. Many of these makers, like the Panormo family, were émigrés, and some chose to continue in the traditions they were taught. Others, such as the brothers Dominique and Arnould Roudhloff from Mirecourt, France, were less conservative and popularized the recently invented melophonic guitar, with its larger-than-average body size and the newly applied X bracing. (More on that subject in a future article in American Lutherie.) Louis Panormo is especially fascinating and prolific. It is thought that his father Vincenzo Panormo, originally from Palermo, Sicily, moved to London from Paris with his four sons, including five- or six -year-old Louis, in 1789, almost certainly to escape the troubles in revolutionary Paris. (“Panormus” is the standard classical and medieval Latin name for Palermo, a name which scholars believe the ancestral “Trusiano” family acquired when they were living in Naples.) Many of Vincenzo’s family became involved in the music business as performers, teachers, and makers of stringed instruments. Louis flourished in London from about 1816 to 1854 and developed his own “Spanish-style” model, although it is not clear how much he really understood about the Spanish school of guitar making. I set out to assess the legitimacy of his claim. For example, he built his guitars face-down around the soundboard, that is, with the back fitted last. Although this is now the most usual and accepted method for making modern Spanish-style guitars, Louis Panormo may have been the first to do it, as this was not the norm for the early Spanish school of guitar making. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
