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Posts: 4530
Joined: Aug. 9 2006
From: Iran (living in Germany)
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to avimuno)
oh man ... all these "signature guitars". Felipe Conde had one new special "tomatito" model too in the fair. Played it and honestly didn't like it at all ..... the standard cypress conde sounded and played best, as always.
btw, this guy is the funniest luthier/seller i have ever seen. Asked him how much for the one I liked very much ... he said he has to think about it and has to talk to his partner, then he left the room. We waited like 15 minutes and kept on playing. He didn't come back. Instead he was sitting outside playing a guitar himself lol ... So we had to go out and ask him again and this game kept on going for a long time Finally i said to him: you are a very good luthier, but an even better businessman. All he said (with a sneaky smile on his joker face) was : PURO ! lol
Posts: 4530
Joined: Aug. 9 2006
From: Iran (living in Germany)
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to el carbonero)
quote:
ORIGINAL: el carbonero
Last week i go to madrid in mariano shop, and the fist thing to tell to me mariano and his son : "felipe had never make a guitar in his life" ,
Well, this is like asking recently divorced people what they think about the other part.
Its pretty much obvious what kind of an answer you get from each side. Thats why I never asked Felipe about Mariano and vice versa, never asked Mariano about Felipe. I really don't care about their internal problems as long as the guitars are good. Mariano's were good too. Pretty much the same thing. The only problem was there was this dumb band (pop or something) right infront of Marianos small stand and they played so loud all day long and you couldn't hear a damn thing except their shiity music. Totally ****ed up organization in the acoustic section of the fair. I think many luthiers complained about it. Felipe had an extra small room which you could close and play without the messy sound from outside.
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to Arash)
i want tell PMI that's all . pulgar arriba y mayor indice abajo .
All people do that.personallyi for this i prefer pmi at pai,more powerfull
pmi -ami pai .... if you want more punch you can do golpe with the thumb under the strings just before up the thump . At 1.05 he do the thumb golpe ,it's sure we can ear ,but the first i dont ear the golpe.
Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to Arash)
quote:
Mariano's were good too. Pretty much the same thing.
Because, if he can so admit about his brother then it stands to reason most likely, HE NEVER BUILT A GUITAR IN HIS LIFE EITHER....therefore both bro's have been contracting out as has been rumored all along since the 90's. I only know the new felipe guitars function same as my A26's from the 90's...same people built em who ever it was.
for the record I talked to felipe's wife and she seemed to know a lot about guitars, she said the rift was pretty permanent between the brothers, but has no such nasty comments about Mariano as Carbonero suggested. In my experience, the bad mouther is the "bad" one normally.
Most likely, they are both building guitars for real NOW after some years of contracting out (probably 2003-2010 or so) and simply got in a fight about who's guitar is better.
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to Ricardo)
quote:
she said the rift was pretty permanent between the brothers, but has no such nasty comments about Mariano as Carbonero suggested.
Have you been on Mariano's new website lately? I saw a whole bunch of stuff about letters he wrote to newspapers after Paco passed away and Felipe told the journalists he had made Paco's guitars. Mariano wrote to them to say that neither he nor his brother made Paco's guitars, it was their father. All very odd.
quote:
In my experience, the bad mouther is the "bad" one normally.
In my experience also that is often true. But also the really twisted bad mouth-ers seem to be able to rely on that to get away with crap knowing that no one will want to talk about it or they will look bad
Posts: 4530
Joined: Aug. 9 2006
From: Iran (living in Germany)
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to Ricardo)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Ricardo In my experience, the bad mouther is the "bad" one normally.
yeah most of the time thats the case. sometimes though, there are otherwise "good" people who are simply not diplomatic or smart or whatever enough to keep quite and out of anger about something, lose it and say something.
So, I'm really not sure whats goin on there between them. (and as mentioned don't care much). and for me both are "good" as long as the guitars are good.
Btw, picked up another "special" 1F extra which the brothers (no problems between these two young fellas :D) built for me (gave the order last year and picked it up this year), what a dream sound, pulsation and playability .... btw, they are going to change their models next year (again) .... there will be a 100 years anniversary model and also probably no more cheap 2F models .. they will also reduce quantity
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Posts: 598
Joined: Feb. 9 2007
From: Paris, France
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to Arash)
I have some more infos concerning these guitars. They are basically Navarro's Grand Concert Reyes Blanca with some tweakings from Vicente. They are planning on building a total of 250 over the course of the next 5 years, and they will only be available directly from Vicente's website. They are saying that Vicente will try and sign all of them, but we all know that this kind of information cannot be taken very seriously. And even if he does, does it mean that Vicente will personally guarantee the quality of every single instrument (i.e. will he return an instrument to Navarro if it's not on par with his standards or will he just sign the label and sell it)?!
Here are the specifications: Nut Width: 52mm Scale Length: 655mm Neck Thickness: 21mm Top: Spruce Finish: French Polish
I'm not exactly sure as to what these tweakings are, but these guitars seem rather expensive to me, especially since you can buy a Navarro GC Reyes for a lot less. The blanca retails for €3,600 and the Indian Rosewood negra goes for €4,100 (exclusive of VAT). That's respectively around USD 5,000 and USD 5,600 for buyers in the US, and without shipping. Plus one might have to add taxes to this, depending on the country the guitar is shipped to. As a reminder, a Navarro GC Reyes costs around USD 3,500 (including shipping to the US) if you order it directly from him... or at least, it did up to a few months ago.
I have no doubt that these guitars must be good. I have played a Navarro Reyes and it was pretty damn close to my Blackshear Reyes in terms of feel and tone. The only thing lacking was the impression of uniqueness I get when I pick up my Blackshear - that guitar was entirely built by Tom, who is without a doubt a master builder of concert guitars. The Navarro felt less precious, less unique, if that makes sense. But it was still so close that I was seriously considering buying one so that I could leave my Blackshear at home and use the Navarro for gigs. But the prices Vicente is asking do not seem like good business practices to me.
I think that I will let Vicente develop his business and make money, whilst I keep buying my guitars directly from the makers, or from good dealers, where most of the cash you pay goes to the craftsman and the quality of the materials that go into building the guitar.
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to Arash)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Arash
Btw, picked up another "special" 1F extra which the brothers (no problems between these two young fellas :D) built for me (gave the order last year and picked it up this year), what a dream sound, pulsation and playability .... btw, they are going to change their models next year (again) .... there will be a 100 years anniversary model and also probably no more cheap 2F models ..
What is 'special' about your 1F Extra?
I read they have updated their 1F Extras' with a slimmer neck profile/carbon reinforcement and the price has gone up.
I have a Bulerias negra, it's neck is on the meaty side. I'd like to try one of their new 1F's. The clips at Mundo Flamenco sound good, in particular the Madagascar RW negra to my ears.
RE: Vicente Amigo playing the Vicent... (in reply to avimuno)
all these are recorded in his house with very basic recording gear, it sounds like, and lots of room. and we're all listening to them on various quality computer speakers, headphones from cheap to expensive, maybe some studio monitors. very hard to tell anything about how they sound.
given all that, to me they sound pretty good, but then vicente playing a ukelele would probably sound pretty good.
of the 4 of 5, this blanca seems to have the most punch.
i've heard good things about navarro's reyes models and he's been building guitars for 30+ years. vicente could have picked anyone to build his 'signature' line. the fact that he chose navarro probably has to do with these being good guitars, and the wholesale price (since they're built in paracho) is lower than valencia.
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