aarongreen -> RE: Help..freaking out (Feb. 24 2010 5:31:21)
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quote:
I know what you mean Aaron, And it might be to square to talk about American or Spanish ways. It was just an ilustration. And there is something in it. Its not a coincidence tha Smirnoff (the one with the taptuning books) is American. The percentage of builders building like that or using some methods like that is A LOT higher in the US than in Spain. I think what you are seeing is the one of the effects that the information sharing system started by the Guild of American Luthiers has had on lutherie in general. So yes this from that point of view, one could state that this book is the product of what was started in America. Which is far from a bad thing (not that you implied that it was bad). Many builders have gone through great trouble to share their experience, and by doing so have contributed to the greater understanding and as a result everyone's work has gotten a lot better, rising tides raise all ships as it were. In the 20 years or so I have been building I have seen standards go up considerably. Many of those builders have done rather well for themselves, doing well by doing good, so it makes sense that others will try to promote their own agenda or reputation via this route. There is a well known book from England, called Making Master Guitars that I would put into this category. Not that all the info is bad but the section on making has a lot of issues that shows quite clearly to me the level of work the author was, at time of writing, capable of and it falls short of the title. So you know, it's not just the Americans.:) Getting back to Smirnoff's book, I will state for the record that I have never seen it but find the concept pretty far out there. In that kind of abstract format a book on plate tuning makes a lot more sense as it is a visual and much more apparently analytical methodology. Now as someone who studied with one of the most published proponents and researchers into the science of acoustics, I can state with a fair amount of credibility that in no way, shape or form is this anything other than another way of looking at what already exists and we all deal with everyday in our shops. The idea that science or an analytical approach is there to refute is incorrect. It's like a candle in the dark, what's there is there regardless of whether it's illuminated or not. If it's a good guitar, and good musicians like it, then this methodology may help show you why that is, in this particular case. If it's a bad guitar and no one likes it, then it might help you understand, in another way, why that is, in this particular case. That's it. In my own work I am always tapping and flexing my guitars, and when there is something I don't think is quite right, I find it extremely helpful to run the first main wood modes, the top in particular and how it is shaped and how quickly is information that I can use. In the end if I like the way the guitar sounds when tapped, feels when flexed then I can guarantee you that the modes will be well formed. Anything can be turned into religion and in our modern world, science is perceived to trump all (although I find it incredibly interesting that quantum mechanics is basically saying what Buddhists have been saying for thousands of years) this is a fault of the practitioners, salesmen or those who want a shortcut at any expense. Smirnoff's methods may work for him although the only way to prove that is of course to play one of his guitar, which I haven't. Frankly however you go about building guitars, the final proof is in the pudding as it were. There are a ton of mediocre builders the world over and there are great masters in every country. If you are getting great results, consistently, and great guitarists want top play your guitars....then you know what you are doing and no amount of science or voodoo can refute that. In the case of science though it will, if it's real, support that fact. So I advise everyone to learn a bit about the mechanics of what makes a guitar tick, if for no other reason than to have another way of interpreting what is going on when they are in their shop. aaron
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