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I would say the first question is who's the maker? Oh, and are we talking negra or blanca?

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[Kalo,
I have Culpepper Blanca with a Cedar top. Great instrument but as pgh_flamenco says, Cedar is soft plus its french polished so I don't think that's helping either, of course neither is my poor technique :) Since I use my instrument for accompanying and gigs it has gotten dinged up a bit more than my Burguet Spruce top Blanca did in the past. My fellow guitarist in our group has a Navarro student model and loves my Culpepper and you can certainly tell the difference in sound and playability, but frankly I think his Navarro is a pretty decent guitar for the money...

Trust me you'll love your Culpepper guitar, Cedar or Spruce no matter which one you choose he builds a wonderful instrument for the money and I don't think you can go wrong. Don't be afraid to go for the Cedar, to me its more about how the luthier builds it rather than just the choice of top wood.
Sig-- /quote]

Hi Sig,

And thank for your comment. I had a Student Navarro and yeah for the money it was nice, but, I am now moving up to the next leve. It's great to know that you really LOVE your Culpepper guitar.

I am seriously, thinking of going with SPRUCE, my friend who grew up on Sabicas loves Cedar, but, being that Navarro was Spruce, I think I am going to stick to what I have....

I am thinking of having the nut width at 51 mm, 650 mm scale, and the thing that is nice about Andy's car is the spatial of his strings via the bridge. I belive he builts it at 57mm which is narrower then most that luthiers built....

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love the cedar sound of my guitar but I really think that any well made guitar gets a good tone from any suitable tonewood. When I try out guitars I don't give a **** on the matrials, it has to feel good and that's it, just never buy an instrument you didn't ever play before except you want to make some bucks trading it.

Hi bursche,

I agree with you that one should never buy an instrument without playing it, but, Andy doesn't have any premade instruments for me to try and being that I going to tweak just a few things for my SMALL, hands (I am a girl playing flamenco guitarist) I don't think I can go wrong....

Thanks for all your cool responses!

Kalo

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Hey Kalo, I would say talk with Andy about it. I'm sure he will help you choose the best direction. He's a high quality builder, and I want to get one of his guitars myself...

Now that your head has been put to spinning by all of the information, lets see if I can be of any help. It seems that if your use to/ liked the sound of your spruce Navarro, I would stick with that. If you had played a few good cedar flamencos and fell in love with the sound, than my advice may would be different. As it is though you may be best off with spruce. After all, you already know that you like the tone of spruce.

Cedar will take more damage from the nails than spruce, but that's just a part of life. A spruce top will also take dings easier than anyone would wish. I always say that on a new guitar the first scratch is about the worse feeling you can have. Once that first scratch is on though, you can finely loosen up and play. After all you already have one scratch, what's another.

I know Andy had a video of a cedar guitar he built a month or 2 ago, and it sounded killer, but the same statement applies to his spruce tops.

Now here's the kicker. I love both negras and blancas, but for my flamenco taste I would prioritize my guitar buying. First I feel that the most important guitar for flamenco is a good blanca. Lets just say a spruce blanca. Then my next guitar on the list would be a negra, and I would round out my list with a cedar blanca. If you go this way and buy a negra after your first blanca and decide that you like the "negra sound" better, than buy a cedar negra as your 3rd guitar. Or best of all, just buy a cedar and spruce blanca, and a cedar and spruce negra...

So the short answer from me is, if this is going to be your first concert flamenco, you may be best off going with a spruce blanca. Again, this is just my thoughts based on my feelings... If I could only own 1 guitar, I would probably pick a spruce blanca. In the end I'm still mostly a spruce fan, and mostly a blanca fan... And please do keep us updated on the progress of your guitar!

P.S, and one more thing, I understand about you wanting to go with the 650 scale, but don't be afraid of the 655. I had the same thoughts when I ordered my negra. I thought that I would only be comfortable on 650, but I decided to try the 660, and in the end the stretch didn't affect me much at all. Just keep it in mind. Another 5 MM is not to big of a deal in the end. Again, just a thought, as I said, I know where your coming from...

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Smaller guitars feel awkward for us 6' + long armed people but in your case you should look at the positives. If you take a piece of cardboard and cut it into two squares one bigger then the other you will notice the smaller piece is stiffer even though it is the exact same material, this is the same with soundboards. Smaller guitars are more energy efficient and have a lively charm about them because this increased stiffness allows for a lightly braced lighter weight soundboard. Smaller meaning in the Santos/Torres range.
My suggestion, discuss with Andy the possibility of a 645 scale guitar with a slightly smaller body, appropriate neck dimensions and string spacings for your hand size. I would also suggest going with a soundport on a smaller bodied guitar, this is where their use really shines.
The most important thing is for you to get a guitar that you are so incredibly comfortable playing you just can't put it down. I'm sure Andy will be more then happy to make you exactly what you need, that is the beauty of working with a luthier. Cedar or Spruce, they both work and both have their advantages.

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Glad I said something worth while. LOL I just love talking about guitars!

As has been said in a round-about-way, you can't go wrong with either spruce or cedar from Andy. One thing to factor in is your hand strength. In theory it takes less energy to get a cedar top going because of the stiffness... I play freaking hard! So I don't notice any difference. If you have a somewhat strong attack in the right hand, don't worry about it at all, you'll be fine with either cedar or spruce...

It sounds like most of your concern is with the neck and the left hand. In that case you may also want to consider having Andy round the neck somewhat when he carves it. My blanca is 52 MM nut, 650 scale, and has a flat and somewhat thick neck. Nothing wrong with that, and it plays fine for me, but I notice a lot of difference in it and my negra which has a pretty rounded neck, 660 scale and 51 MM nut. I seem to notice the contrast between the flat neck and rounded neck more so than I do the 1 MM difference in nut width.

Also start thinking about if you want pegs, planetary pegs, or tuning machines. I have guitars with each, and by far the planetary pegs are my favorite! Again this is just a preference which is personal to the player, and Andy can give you his thoughts as a builder who's installed all options.

I know what you mean about having the cash for guitars. Its a big investment... That's why I gave you my list of preferences with buying a blanca first. Being that I have a good cedar blanca and a good spruce negra, I'm half way through my list. My next guitar will be a good spruce blanca. After that I will go after the cedar negra, or so I hope... Aw yes, some day...

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645 will be plenty long enough to drive a smaller bodied guitar and the soundport will lower the air resonance. Torres did a similar trick with a tornavoz but with a soundport you will get the stereo like effect and hear the guitar better. You need a slightly smaller but properly shaped proportioned neck, a thin flat neck may feel easy to fit your hand around but it gives you no leverage which leads to quicker fatigue and when the practice hours go up left hand injuries.