About the soul of guitar. Just for sharing.

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jmb

Posts: 119
Joined: Oct. 14 2014
From: Vallecas - Madrid - Spain

About the soul of guitar. Just for s...

Surely is in the forum. But I did not find it.

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Suenas payo ¡y lo sabes!

Sing and string - other flamenco blog

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 23 2015 10:47:47

Ricardo

Posts: 14801
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

Interesting. I agree about the microphone issue...but I am curious about luthier's thoughts on the pitch issue...he says a master guitar has to be lower pitch to be good quality. In my experience, flamenco guitars with a lower pitch often have a nice punch and bottom end, but oddly lack in the trebel response. Most guitars I find are closer to pitch A or G#...and guitars I prefer don't have too much of the actual frequency jumping out as it makes the guitar unbalanced.

Ricardo

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

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 26 2015 15:21:49

estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

F# but with a top thats not 'slack', I shoot for F# and G# A is to high, gets fincky.

La Leona is one amazing sounding guitar, did the bridge, no saddle.

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https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 26 2015 16:12:50

Cloth Ears

Posts: 152
Joined: Apr. 26 2005

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

Fascinating stuff. How do I find out what my guitars soundboards are tuned to?

------
@ 3:47

My Berber friend Said with his Martin steel string in Mirador San Nicholas. He plays like Michael Hedges et al. and is the most relaxed person I have ever met. I will have to send him the link!

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 26 2015 16:56:55

guitarbuddha

Posts: 2970
Joined: Jan. 4 2007

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

I'm far more concerned by the player's phrasing and harmonic awareness than I am interested in the sound of this guitar.

D.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 26 2015 17:05:00

SephardRick

Posts: 358
Joined: Apr. 11 2014

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

Those bass strings are robust!

It just goes to show how luthiers are a breed apart. For a guitar without a saddle it works and sounds remarkably well. What player thought, that a saddle was not a necessary functioning part of the guitar?

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Rick

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 26 2015 19:14:03

johnguitar

Posts: 208
Joined: Jan. 10 2006

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

I have infinite respect for working guitar-makers, especially ones who make excellent instruments. The theories and fantasies of an engineer and "restorer" about great guitars are not so interesting. Here is some information about Benno Streu http://liuto-forte.com/team_streu_benno_en.html It is written by someone who has great respect for him but it does support the information I have that he never made a guitar. He was one of those people who tried to tell guitar-makers how to make guitars whithout having a clue! I have never heard anything so ridiculous as: "In master grade instruments (guitars) this note (F zero) is F#." I'll stop now because I am getting hot under the collar as I write.

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John Ray
https://www.johnguitar.com

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 27 2015 8:47:48

Anders Eliasson

Posts: 5780
Joined: Oct. 18 2006

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

quote:

He was one of those people who tried to tell guitar-makers how to make guitars whithout having a clue!

oh - oh, remember that you are writing on a forum where there are many members trying to do the same...
I´ll stop now as well.

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

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 27 2015 9:04:55

Thomas

Posts: 225
Joined: Oct. 5 2005

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

What a nice find! Benno Streu lived in my hometown and was a really generous man with a big heart for guitarists and their instruments.
He and his wife always were smoking like hyperactive volcanos so that the guitars still were stinking two weeks after they left his house....

When I first met him he had one hand in the soundhole and the other was holding the inevitable cigarette, he looked at me and said: "You have to treat the guitar like a woman"....and his wife eagerly agreed.

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TeFau Studio Thomas Vogt
Cuadro Sur Guitar Trio

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 27 2015 10:18:27

Sr. Martins

Posts: 3077
Joined: Apr. 4 2011

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to Thomas)

quote:

When I first met him he had one hand in the soundhole and the other was holding the inevitable cigarette, he looked at me and said: "You have to treat the guitar like a woman"....and his wife eagerly agreed.

Yes there such thing as a "G fan brace"?

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 27 2015 10:37:27

estebanana

Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

He is an amazing guitarist. http://www.wulfin-lieske.de/english/nav0.html

I don't know who the guy in the video is Benno, or if he knows anything, but it should not matter. The F# comment might be some thing he has heard from builders. Many very fine makers consider the F# to G# range for the main air resonance to be a median area to hit. The guy may not in fact know anything, but what he said is not controversial.

I was checking out the La Leona a few years ago when Wulfin Lieske came into owning it. He made a recording with it that is pretty nice. It really does interest me that this guitar sounds some wonderful but has not saddle, the bridge is really like large baroque guitar bridge. Its one of the few guitars I have an itch to make a bench copy of, but of course I'll probably never even get to see it in person in my life. But if I could I would like to copy that one as carefully as I could.

He is good player too and the composers he chooses to play are not what most other guitarists are going for. The guy Benno may be a crackpot, but for some reason Lieske lets him handle his Torres.

" He and his wife always were smoking like hyperactive volcanos"

This is really funny, next time I meet a chain smoker I will remember this.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 27 2015 13:31:21

SephardRick

Posts: 358
Joined: Apr. 11 2014

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to estebanana)

quote:

The guy Benno may be a crackpot, but for some reason Lieske lets him handle his Torres

Excellent point.

From Thomas' personal dealings with Benno and his wife, he seems like good folk to me.

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Rick

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Feb. 27 2015 14:08:38

Ricardo

Posts: 14801
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to SephardRick)

quote:

ORIGINAL: SephardRick

Those bass strings are robust!

It just goes to show how luthiers are a breed apart. For a guitar without a saddle it works and sounds remarkably well. What player thought, that a saddle was not a necessary functioning part of the guitar?

I talked about this for a while now, about how the break angle ain't no big deal as we had to repair a students's guitar that had the string holes damaged such that you could not lower the bone. Actually we lowered the bone for sake of action and there was zero break angle and the resulte was the guitar was clear and loud as before....so you can take any bone out of the bridge the guitar sounds just fine (so long as neck angle allows the action to clear the frets for a clean enough sound)... but there was a problem we noticed. The strings rattle or buzz at the bridge, and annoyingly so if you play hard. So it is as if the saddle functions only to allow the player to fine tune he action, and prevent buzzing.

So the guy playing in the video with no saddle has that annoying buzzing at the bridge I am talking about, but the guitar is as loud as any other thanks to the action being high enough. About the song the guy is playing, the first thing that hit my mind when I heard the intro was Caracol:
http://youtu.be/jQgb6oRgHUQ

About the old guy being nutty, it's what I thought, though faulk seems to agree that that many luthier seem to think it IS important (about F# vs other being ideal), a clear divide in opinion. Interesting.

Ricardo

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CD's and transcriptions available here:
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Mar. 1 2015 15:27:35

SephardRick

Posts: 358
Joined: Apr. 11 2014

RE: About the soul of guitar. Just f... (in reply to jmb)

Ricardo,

Thanks for sharing some insight on the bridge only design. That makes perfect sense that a saddle is used for adjusting the action. It is much easier to change out a saddle than a bridge.

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Rick

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Mar. 1 2015 15:37:32