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Ron.M -> RE: tricks of the trade? (Jun. 14 2004 21:32:39)
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Zurdo,
I know you are a guitar dealer and have to keep in touch with all the issues.
On the coloured string issue, well, frankly I was lying!
I actually do know, but was reluctant to tell, lest no one would believe me.
I may as well disclose this episode which happened to me back in 1970...
One day as I was coming out of the old Ramirez shop in Madrid , I practically tripped up over somebody sitting on the pavement outside, who asked me if I could spare "a few pesetas for an old man."
Whilst digging in my pocket for some loose change, he asked me what I had bought.
I told him, just some Savarez strings for my guitar....
He reached out for them, took one look at them and threw them to the ground.
"Paa!...French muck! ... Where are you from amigo?... Let me tell you the true story of true Spanish stringmaking."
I picked up my packet of strings and quickly pocketed them, as he beckoned me to sit beside him.
"Look amigo", he said "I spent forty five years of my life making strings in the old "Black String" factory up in the North of this city, until I became too old to work anymore.
Nobody could make strings like us amigo... Nobody.
Even The Maestro himself used them as you can see on his Album cover.
Back in those days, all the orphans from the various barrios would come, barefoot and dressed in rags bringing us dead cats, mostly the result of road accidents etc, for which the Manager would pay between one and three pesetas each one, depending on the quality and blackness of the cat.
One day a boy, just a child of maybe nine or ten, appeared with one of the fattest and blackest cats I had ever seen...La Madre Mia!...it was a sight indeed to behold!
The Manager quicky sent someone up to fetch the Señorito, the owner of the Factory.
He came down and inspected it, smiled and nodded in approval, and pressed a shiny duro piece into the urchin's grubby hand.
Hombre!.... Five pesetas for a cat?...It was unheard of in those days I tell you!
I have never come across such a cat since.
When we had collected enough cats, then the Head Stringmaker would light the fire under the brine filled Cauldron and once it was up to temperature, the Apprentices would lower the dead cats in, a similar kind of process really as boiling horses down for glue.
The broth was then lovingly hand stirred by Apprentices who would sleep and work in shifts for three nights and three days, slowly reducing to a thick, black gloop.
At that point, the Head Stringmaker would return, constantly checking the consistency and quality every two minutes, even forgoing meal times until it was just perfect.
At that point he would shout "Eso Es!"
We'd immediately all stop playing cards or fooling around and we'd all stand in silence.
An Appentice would run to fetch the Señorito, who would return with a phial of his 'secret ingedient', which was the elixor of turning the gloop into strings.
The potion was poured in and quickly stirred by the Head Stringmaker, who would then take a long rod, known as "El Varilla" and carefully pull up a filament of the black substance, pulling it slowly across a 100 metre long glass table, at which were seated some thirty or so girls.
These girls were not your usual cigar rollers from the Tobacco Factories, but hand picked, imported workers from the Spaghetti rolling industry in Italia.
They could roll that cooling filament to within a thousanth of a millimetre with just the touch of their hands...we didn't even have a micrometer in the Factory!
It was a joy to watch them work.
When the filament had cooled sufficiently and had achieved it's strength and suppleness, it was then cut up into lengths and placed in packets suitable for selling."
I told him I was truly amazed at this "underworld" of string manufacture, and I asked him about the red strings I had seen.
Where were they made?
He laughed and nodded...
"Si Hombre, recuerdo muy bien", he said smiling.
"It was a foreigner, Americano, I think, started a Factory here in Madrid looking for a new innovation in strings.
He wasn't a cat man though, mainly dogs....
After many months experimenting he came up with the Red Setter as the best for strength and durability.
Some people didn't like them much, as the strings would leave red marks on the bridge and the rollers.
Actually they used to sell the red dog distillate to Conde Hermanos, who would mix it with Shellac and Turpentine to finish their guitars with.
They liked the reddish-orange finish and said it gave the guitars more of a bite and growl."
I thanked him for his story and as I was about to go, he asked me for fifty pesetas for another bottle of "Fundador" as all this story telling was making him thirsty.
So that's the true story of coloured strings, brought to you for the first time exclusively on this Forum.
cheers
Ron
PS Do you think Jason Webster would be interested in this for his new book "Duende Revisited"?
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