Help me identify this blanca please

Costs are rising and times are tough.
Please consider a donation to keep this
place going.

Welcome to one of the most active flamenco sites on the Internet. Guests can read most posts but if you want to participate click here to register.

This site is dedicated to the memory of Paco de Lucía, Ron Mitchell, Guy Williams, Linda Elvira, Philip John Lee, Craig Eros, Ben Woods, David Serva and Tom Blackshear who went ahead of us.

We receive 12,200 visitors a month from 200 countries and 1.7 million page impressions a year. To advertise on this site please contact us.

You are logged in as Guest

Users viewing this topic: none

Printable Version

All Forums >>Discussions >>Lutherie >>

Page: [1]

Message

<< Newer Topic Older Topic >>

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

Help me identify this blanca please

I recently found this guitar which I picked up very cheap. It plays really well and sounds great. The thing is it needs a great deal of repair. Its got some cracks and needs refinishing and Im wondering how much to spend on her. The biggest problem is she has lost her label and I haven't got a dental mirror to look under the top for a makers stamp.... so a prize of a second hand set of strings will be awarded to anyone who can help me identify this instrument.

First clue is the rossette. It doesnt look like a stock design and Im pretty sure its hand inlayed. You can see the individual blocks that make the 6 pointed figure and it looks like a custom job. Anyone seen this before?

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

Attachment (1)

_____________________________

Follow my blog http://pimientito.wordpress.com/

"Ceremonial" by Mark Shurey "Pimientito". CD and digital download vailable on Amazon and
CDbaby. http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/markshurey

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:32:36

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007

[Deleted]

Post has been moved to the Recycle Bin at Aug. 22 2010 13:34:52

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:34:44

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

I've blown up the detail here

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:36:25

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

Next clue is the headstock, nice rosewood veneer but I don't recognise the shape.

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:38:20

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

Third clue is the heel. Its a mahogany neck with a 5 part heel block capped with a piece of rosewood. Here is the exterior.

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:40:56

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

And here is the interior. It doesn't have that slipper shape and I'm pretty sure from the tone and construction that this isn't a Granada instrument now....although I will happily be proved wrong :)

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:43:28

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

The body is a beautiful piece of cyprus. This guitar has very heavily used and has been bashed about quite a lot but it must have been expensive new.

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:45:46

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

Finally the spruce top...as I say its been heavily used and badly repaired. Parts of the guitar look like they have been touched up with a pot of varnish. I want to get those golpe plates off, repair the cracks, sand down the neck, re laquer the whole instrument and set it up. It does sound and play well So I would consider doing that if it was a worthwhile instrument.

Anyone who knows what this is or has similar looking headstock or rosette photos, I would love to hear from you.

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 13:52:54

gj Michelob

Posts: 1531
Joined: Nov. 7 2008
From: New York City/San Francisco

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

Nice find. The Rosette speaks of consummate craftsmanship, regardless of your ability to affiliate the guitar with a famous name.

The feel of the headstock (although in your find is not as sharp, but curved rather) and of the rosette (but not identical) immediately brought to mind, Marcelino Lopez.

I remember one of his guitars well, because I was considering it the first time a visited GSI in LA; I held it in my hands at length and studied it very carefully. Its sound was beautifully hollow, purely resonant of aged wood. Here are a few.
However, it could very well be a copy of a Lopez or Santos, in the same fashion Vazquez Rubio or Kenny Hill replicated the “Reyes” model. The Rosette is nearly identical to the Spanish Master’s design and the headstock retraces nearly all elements of the complex Reyes.

Marcelino Lopez
http://www.classicguitar.com/61Lopez277_lg.html

Marcelino Lpez
http://www.guitarsalon.com/product.php?productid=279

Marcelino Lpez
http://www.guitarsalon.com/product.php?productid=277

Marcelino Lpez
http://www.denverfolklore.com/instrument_photos/Marcelino_Lopez_photos.htm

Note: According to Lopez himself, he was asked by Hernandez in 1971 to build a guitar for him, who was very pleased with it and ordered more and more. After some time Hernandez asked Lopez to build an exact copy of his own guitar (the original Hernandez y Aguado guitar) which is what he did after quite some time of examining this guitar. Hernandez was extremely pleased with it. From 1971 until Hernandez died, Lopez built 30 guitars for him.

This guitar is a copy of that Hernandez y Aguado model Marcelino Lopez built for Hernandez, therefore the stamp inside: H A.
http://members.tripod.com/music_treasures/acguit.htm

------------ a few other sharing certain traits in the headstock, but i a much sharper version:
Santos Hernandez
http://www.guitarsalon.com/product.php?productid=601

Barbero
http://www.guitarsalon.com/product.php?productid=549

Manuel de la Chica
http://www.guitarsalon.com/product.php?productid=555

_____________________________

gj Michelob

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 15:09:37

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to gj Michelob)

Thanks for the input gj. The soundhole does remind me of Lopez on the website (posted below)

I stuck my hand inside to get an idea of the bracing. There is a double brace under the finger board. The first just under the rosette which you can see in the photo and the second a couple of inches behind it.
The body has a 5 strut fan bracing under the top. There is a small crack under the transparent golpeador and the wood under the white golpeador appears (by feel) to be intact....certainly no holes. The guitar was obviously dropped at some point and the right side portion has a couple of ugly cracks badly repaired. There is a hairline crack on the left body portion that appears stable. I agree that regardless of the maker this is a good guitar but I think I would need to spend at least 500 euros getting it back to her her former splendour.
(300 for repairs and another couple of hundred for finishing)

Images are resized automatically to a maximum width of 800px

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 22 2010 16:24:52

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

Ok...I think I know what it is now. The polyeurethane laquer on the body dates the guitar to the 70's so its around 35 years old. I think its Valencian....maybe an old Sanchis primera??

_____________________________

Follow my blog http://pimientito.wordpress.com/

"Ceremonial" by Mark Shurey "Pimientito". CD and digital download vailable on Amazon and
CDbaby. http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/markshurey

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 23 2010 12:27:48

Andy Culpepper

Posts: 3023
Joined: Mar. 30 2009
From: NY, USA

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

Not sure why but my gut is telling me Valencia..something about the rosette. There is almost "too much" going on, not typical of Andalusian makers' rosettes IMO.
Also the shape of the foot suggests that it might be a dovetail joint (as in separate neck and body construction)

_____________________________

Andy Culpepper, luthier
http://www.andyculpepper.com

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 23 2010 12:41:16

beno

Posts: 881
Joined: Nov. 3 2006
From: Hungary

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

I've seen similar headstock shape on some rodriguez:

http://www.classicguitar.com/90Rodriguez_lg.html

altough not exactly the same.... That top looks very dark for a spruce or is it coloured in any way???

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 23 2010 12:54:49

ngiorgio

Posts: 168
Joined: Nov. 1 2005
From: Florida, USA

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to beno)

The top appears to be cedar. Inexpensive machines. The dovetail joined neck to body isn't common in guitars produced in Spain. Perhaps a 1970's vintage Estudio model from a Valencia factory.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 23 2010 16:16:58

buleria74

Posts: 135
Joined: Jan. 23 2010

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

I believe it was made in Cordoba.

_____________________________

Flamenco no tiene mas que un escuela, transmitir o no transmitir !

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 31 2010 20:55:46

keith

Posts: 1108
Joined: Sep. 29 2009
From: Back in Boston

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

buleria 74--why do you think it was built in cordoba?

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Sep. 4 2010 1:33:01

Pimientito

Posts: 2481
Joined: Jul. 30 2007
From: Marbella

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to buleria74)

I am curious too...why Cordoba?

_____________________________

Follow my blog http://pimientito.wordpress.com/

"Ceremonial" by Mark Shurey "Pimientito". CD and digital download vailable on Amazon and
CDbaby. http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/markshurey

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Sep. 12 2010 9:38:41

Ricardo

Posts: 14833
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: Help me identify this blanca please (in reply to Pimientito)

first guess was student guitar built in valencia for manuel rodriguez and sons.

_____________________________

CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Sep. 12 2010 14:48:25