Elevated Fretboard

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Elevated Fretboard

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tocaor.andres

Posts: 12
Joined: Jun. 18 2009
From: SACRAMENTO. CA

Elevated Fretboard

What are some of your opinions on Elevated Fretboards on a flamenco Guitar?

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"Flamenco washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life."

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 2 2009 19:06:25

Mike_Kinny

Posts: 689
Joined: Feb. 12 2009

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

I'm building one and will tell you when it's done.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 2 2009 22:25:03

Anders Eliasson

Posts: 5780
Joined: Oct. 18 2006

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

IMO its a bad idea. You get a weird stringangle and stringheight to the soundboard, making some of the basic flamenco tecniques complicated. (rasgueados, picado and thumb)

To me, whatever guitar which sounds right is worthless if it has a wrong feel in the right hand.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 4 2009 13:34:18

aarongreen

Posts: 367
Joined: Jan. 16 2004

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

Not all elevated fretboard guitars are made the same way. Greg Byer's approach is such that the angle of the neck to the body and as a result, the string height off the soundboard, is the same as a conventional guitar. In other words he achieves the elevated feature by tapering the sides and curving the soundboard starting from about the waist up to the neckblock.

This should work well for someone who wants an elevated neck flamenco guitar. The only issue is that flamenco guitars tend to be narrow, depth-wise and one would have to take this into consideration when deciding how much of elevation they need.

aaron

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 5 2009 5:18:40

minordjango

Posts: 918
Joined: Feb. 26 2005

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

ive had the odd good quality classical and i agree with anders , good call,

honesty from a builder and player cool

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 5 2009 6:03:40

Tom Blackshear

Posts: 2304
Joined: Apr. 15 2008

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

quote:

ORIGINAL: tocaor.andres

What are some of your opinions on Elevated Fretboards on a flamenco Guitar?

I think many elevated fingerboards are being made with very little relief so that they don't have a much higher level off the top. But you could almost perfect this technique without a Humphrey style elevation by reverse graduating the ebony board to be thicker at the 19th fret and thinner at the nut.

Miguel Rodriguez would taper the sides of his upper bout down from the fingerboard area at the center and this would provide some space for more comfortable playing. But if you ask me what I personally thing about it, I would have to say that it's not very traditional and certainly has its down side to providing certain techniques that feel right when playing the flamenco style.

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Tom Blackshear Guitar maker

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 5 2009 11:34:23

Anders Eliasson

Posts: 5780
Joined: Oct. 18 2006

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

Please remember that when I say stringheight above the soundboard, I dont talk solely about the stringheight at the bridge. In fact, thats not really interesting.
What is interesting in order to call a guitar a good flamenco guitar is the stringheight at the soundhole and inbetween the soundhole and the bridge, where you have your thumb positioned and where you do your golpes.

I have yet to see a guitar with an elevated fretboard offereing a flamenco setup.

The idea of lowering the upper bout of the guitar is interesting but also radical. At least it´ll give a good setup.

To repeat myself: Good flamenco players want the guitar to sound well, but they are much more picky when it comes to setup, pulsation and response.

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Blog: http://news-from-the-workshop.blogspot.com/

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 6 2009 0:09:08

aarongreen

Posts: 367
Joined: Jan. 16 2004

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

I understood what you meant in regards to string height. I think things are not quite as set in stone however in regards to what makes a guitar a flamenco guitar. In the end a good flamenco guitar is a guitar that a good flamenco guitarist wants to play. That being said, the strings must be close enough to the top for the golpes and that means in between the soundhole and the bridge. Greg's approach is such that you can achieve this.

The main reason people want elevated fretboards is for upper fret access (duh). The Assads were the first ones to really realize the benefits of the elevated design as they were doing a lot of complicated chords, arpeggios and such, above the 12th fret, in many of the pieces they play. Odiar pretty much lives up there all day. I haven't really seen a flamenco guitarist who does that to the same degree so perhaps this is enough to keep the demand for such a thing at a minimum.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 6 2009 3:39:05

Tom Blackshear

Posts: 2304
Joined: Apr. 15 2008

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to aarongreen)

quote:

ORIGINAL: aarongreen

I understood what you meant in regards to string height. I think things are not quite as set in stone however in regards to what makes a guitar a flamenco guitar. In the end a good flamenco guitar is a guitar that a good flamenco guitarist wants to play. That being said, the strings must be close enough to the top for the golpes and that means in between the soundhole and the bridge. Greg's approach is such that you can achieve this.

The main reason people want elevated fretboards is for upper fret access (duh). The Assads were the first ones to really realize the benefits of the elevated design as they were doing a lot of complicated chords, arpeggios and such, above the 12th fret, in many of the pieces they play. Odiar pretty much lives up there all day. I haven't really seen a flamenco guitarist who does that to the same degree so perhaps this is enough to keep the demand for such a thing at a minimum.

Aaron,......... Reyes built his flamenco with a raised bridge angle that was developed by raising the neck angle too much and this lifted the string height off the top too much, in my opinion. But it also improves strength/torque of sound, so there would have to be a little compromise done here to make the guitar easier to play.

The guitar could be lowered at the upper sound-hole but then this puts everything out of line with the bottom and top of the sound-hole, as you would have to lower the bottom of the sound-hole to make it an even surface. This doesn't necessarily hurt the sound but it does look pretty odd with the bottom half of the sound-hole up a level from the top half.

One of the least offending methods I know of is to taper off the upper bout a little from side to side, and then re-graduate the finger-board to be thickner at the 19th fret, like I mentioned earlier. This institutes a higher neck angle to some degree and improves torque.

Of course this is not a complete ideal as you would have to lower the top around the bridge to keep the string angle closer to the surface. Does this make sense? :-)

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 6 2009 4:43:20

Ricardo

Posts: 14806
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

As a player I am totally in agreement with Anders. No way possible to make an Ideal comfy for the right hand with normal flamenco playing techinques guitar set up with a raised fingerboard. If I had such a guitar I would take right away to a luthier to shave the ebony down as low as possible to make the angle across the face or soundboard as low ande even as possible. (Humphry guitar is quite funny to look at as an extreme example of an ANTI flamenco set up!

) My idea to fix a guitar like that is make a wood golpeador that you glue on in that space that is raised (inches deep in the humphry case LOL) and angled to match the string angle and height so that a cigarette wont roll under the strings. A ridiculous idea but maybe the visual helps see the problem.

Seriously, if high position chords and scales and speed is the issue, there is no way an elevated fingerboard works better than a simple cutaway design.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 6:28:14

Tom Blackshear

Posts: 2304
Joined: Apr. 15 2008

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to Ricardo)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Ricardo

As a player I am totally in agreement with Anders. No way possible to make an Ideal comfy for the right hand with normal flamenco playing techinques guitar set up with a raised fingerboard. If I had such a guitar I would take right away to a luthier to shave the ebony down as low as possible to make the angle across the face or soundboard as low ande even as possible. (Humphry guitar is quite funny to look at as an extreme example of an ANTI flamenco set up! ) My idea to fix a guitar like that is make a wood golpeador that you glue on in that space that is raised (inches deep in the humphry case LOL) and angled to match the string angle and height so that a cigarette wont roll under the strings. A ridiculous idea but maybe the visual helps see the problem.

Seriously, if high position chords and scales and speed is the issue, there is no way an elevated fingerboard works better than a simple cutaway design.

Ricardo, I used to build this type of guitar until nearly every player started calling for a more clean sound. This new trend ruined it as far as I'm concerned. But leave it to some players, they just can't get away from it :-)

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 7:05:06

aarongreen

Posts: 367
Joined: Jan. 16 2004

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

Tom Humphrey's design is certainly not appropriate for flamenco setup. He himself even said that. He told me once that Vicente Amigo had asked him to build him a guitar (after hanging out with the Assads) and Tom told him it wouldn't work.

Anways I am not arguing that an elevated fingerboard guitar is the way to go for flamencos, I am not about to build one. I was just pointing out that there would be a way to make it work very well if use Greg Byer's approach as a starting point. The upshot of his process is the angle of the strings to the face of the guitar is much more like a traditional guitar. He goes into great detail on his website describing his process and while he is building for classical players, one could modify his approach (less elevation) to get the guitar to work within the parameters of a traditional flamenco guitar.

Ricardo,

A cutaway brings it's own set of issues to the table. Not that you can't get around them but I would think about it a long time before I built one. I am not sure if I agree that one approach (cutaway vrs. raised fingerboard) is inherently easier to manage, playing-wise, as I am sure it is a matter of personal taste and I have heard people chime in on both sides of that argument.

Tom,
Got ya, seems like it would work. I also agree that the visual of the soundhole being higher at the waist side than the fingerboard side may be weird but I have seen it before. And it is weird.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 7:16:26

at_leo_87

Posts: 3055
Joined: Aug. 30 2008
From: Boston, MA, U.S.A

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to Tom Blackshear)

quote:

Ricardo, I used to build this type of guitar until nearly every player started calling for a more clean sound. This new trend ruined it as far as I'm concerned. But leave it to some players, they just can't get away from it :-)

tom, is that your guitar?

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 8:23:06

Tom Blackshear

Posts: 2304
Joined: Apr. 15 2008

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to at_leo_87)

quote:

ORIGINAL: at_leo_87

quote:

Ricardo, I used to build this type of guitar until nearly every player started calling for a more clean sound. This new trend ruined it as far as I'm concerned. But leave it to some players, they just can't get away from it :-)

tom, is that your guitar?

Not that one but it is relatively with-in my technique to build with a modified Faustino Conde design. I should say that it is a particular design that I thought about many years ago, and it works, but there have been some additional thoughts running through my head about certain issues with the Conde that have to be modified a little more.

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Tom Blackshear Guitar maker

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 8:52:17

Patrick

Posts: 1189
Joined: Jul. 7 2003
From: Portland, Oregon

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

So how does Marvi do it successfully? It is Marvi isn't it...the guy that built the guitar Nunez uses on his instructional DVD.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 9:26:40

Ricardo

Posts: 14806
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to Patrick)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Patrick

So how does Marvi do it successfully? It is Marvi isn't it...the guy that built the guitar Nunez uses on his instructional DVD.

the fingerboard is not really "raised", I played it. The idea was that the neck goes THROUGH the body and stops at the sound hole. His idea that the extra weight supports the TONE of the high notes, not makes easy to play.

In the video of the guy with Susi, I can't see how "raised" the fingerboard actually is, and obviously, he did not play any notes past the 7th fret, so what was the point of the design again???

Perhaps he can play easier up high, but not much easier with the body of the guitar in the way. No way you can say raised fingerboard=easy to play as a cutaway. With a cut away you dont' have to change left hand position at all, there is nothing there to "reach over". I am sure the only reason for no cutaway is the look. A classical player would rather have a "violin" looking guitar than a Rock star looking guitar. I think a polka dot flying V shape flamenco would be cool, so long as you wear the strap

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

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 10:46:21

Patrick

Posts: 1189
Joined: Jul. 7 2003
From: Portland, Oregon

RE: Elevated Fretboard (in reply to tocaor.andres)

quote:

the fingerboard is not really "raised", I played it. The idea was that the neck goes THROUGH the body and stops at the sound hole. His idea that the extra weight supports the TONE of the high notes, not makes easy to play.

Makes sense

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 7 2009 10:58:22