Traditional golpeador

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f.j.w.

Posts: 20
Joined: Aug. 20 2016

Traditional golpeador

Dear All

Does any one know this:

Before plastic golpeadores wooden golpeadores were used. How were they glued on to the top? Were they glued on to the wood before the instrument was French poslished, or were they glued on to the varnish of the instrument?

If wooden golpeadores were glued onto the varnish, what kind of glue would have been used?

Frank JW

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 24 2016 9:42:34

Echi

Posts: 1132
Joined: Jan. 11 2013

RE: Traditional golpeador (in reply to f.j.w.)

I'm not sure the wood plate was the first choice or anyway more common than a plastic plate in the early flamenco guitars.
Richard Bruné wrote a very nice piece on the origin of the flamenco guitar and we can notice that a clear distinction was made just around 1920 or so (implying the bridge and action was commonly low also in classical guitars at the time).
At that time a plate of black or white plastic were common options as as well.
Anyway, I saw a couple of old flamenco guitars finished with shellac under the plates.
The plate was glued with hot hide glue. I'd say it's reasonable to think that hhg was the first choice for almost everything at the time.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 25 2016 7:36:06

timoteo

Posts: 219
Joined: Jun. 22 2012
From: Seattle, USA

RE: Traditional golpeador (in reply to Echi)

Plastic as we know it didn't really exist in 1920. There was bakelite, but that's rigid and brittle - similar to pottery - so is not really suitable as a golpeador. My guess is they either used celluloid or some other organic product like horn or tortoise shell, all of which were in use in the late 1800's for things which we would make with plastic these days.

I'm sure there must be some existing guitars dating back to the cafe cantante era - it would be interesting to know more about golpeadors used back then. It would be even more interesting to know something about how the use of golpeadors came about, as that relates to the development of flamenco techniques and the differentiation between guitars used for classical music and those used for flamenco. While I've seen a lot of discussion about cypress vs rosewood, pegs vs machines, etc., as determining factors, it seems to me the golpeador is far more indicative of how the guitar was actually used. Brune's paper doesn't mention golpeadors.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 26 2016 7:15:50

Echi

Posts: 1132
Joined: Jan. 11 2013

RE: Traditional golpeador (in reply to f.j.w.)

You are right: I wrote genetically plastic but I meant something like Bakelite or celluloid.
Taking a look on my catalogs: "A collection of fine Spanish guitars" shows just a couple of flamenco guitars with wooden plates: the most have transparent, white or black plates.
A catalog of an exhibition of historical guitars in Madrid with Spanish guitars of the 19th century shows the wood as unique choice.
Taking a look around my guess is that just few guitars got the wooden plate.
The other option is that some golpeadores were originally made of wood and then replaced. I don't really know.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Aug. 26 2016 7:35:07