RobF -> RE: 1st INTERNATIONAL GUITAR MAKING COMPETITION ‘ANTONIO MARIN MONTERO’. GRANADA, 26-29 October 2017 (Nov. 6 2017 4:31:54)
|
I was able to attend the competition but I went to Madrid for five days afterwards and now that I’m home I finally have the time to post about it. John Ray has already given a good account of the competition on his blog and names the winners and follow ups, so I’ll just give my impressions without going into that level of detail. The event was primarily a competition and less emphasis was placed on the exhibiting the instruments. The demographic of the entrants was, perhaps not surprisingly, of new and upcoming makers working towards establishing their careers. Of the 17 entrants, 12 were from Spain and the remainder consisted of two from China, one from Japan, one from Portugal and one from Germany. The two Chinese entrants were past students of the Stephen Hill course in La Herradura, the Japanese entrant served a three month apprenticeship with Antonio Marin five years ago, and I didn’t meet the other two non-Spanish entrants so I don’t know their backgrounds. The gold medal winner and one of the two silver winners were from the Granada region, and both were also alumni of Stephen’s course. Stephen and family attended the last day of the event and from the beaming expression on his face it was obvious that he was very proud of their accomplishments. The other silver winner was from Germany, and was the only female contestant. Five or six of the entries were Flamenco guitars, the remaining were Classical. The contest required each guitar use the same brand of strings (Saverez) and each guitar was demonstrated by either a classical player or a flamenco player, each playing the same piece relating to the type of guitar. Apparently the judging ranked sonic quality at 20%, but following the progress of the guitars through the contest I think the judges gave much more credence to sound quality than that. The guitars that made it to the last round all had excellent sonic qualities that stood out during the first rounds. That being said, the overwhelming majority of the guitars sounded great, so relying on sound alone would have made the judging very difficult, IMO. That brings me to what I felt was a disappointing aspect of the event, in that the public was never given the chance to see the guitars in an exhibition setting. So, I was only able to judge the guitars visually from a distance and had to rely mainly on the sound of the demos to assess their quality. On behalf of future entrants, I hope that the organizers would consider adding an exhibition event to showcase the work of all entrants, perhaps held on the first day before the contest begins. For a maker, it would go a long way towards justifying the expense and stress of entering if the public could see their product up close. As far as the judging goes, I think it was conducted fairly. I had no sense that there was any bias. While two of the winners were from the Granada Provence, their guitars both stood out from the first round as being excellent instruments. By the way, one of the silver winners was a Flamenco Blanca guitar. I personally thought the Flamenco entries overshadowed the Classical entries in the sound demonstrations, but that could have been due to the player. From an entrant’s perspective, I think the event caused a few lost pounds and sleepless nights. But I really don’t see this as having been a vanity event, the judges and entrants were all very sincere. The judging panel contained some of the top builders active today, and I think they were studiously impartial. The contest did have some program inaccuracies that are likely typical of first time events. The public displays alluded to in the program were actually closed door, and while the program indicated the sound demonstrations were closed to the public, I was able to attend all of them without issue, but maybe I was just lucky. The only event attended by a large public gathering was the concert held on the final day, in which the final five entrants had their guitars demonstrated, judged, and the awards granted. I hope this event continues and is held regularly. It’s a great idea and it truly was a celebration of the craft. My congratulations go out to all the entrants and to the winners.
|
|
|
|