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Hi Morante, I noticed something about the head of Conde guitars. Faustino Conde's head is the most noticeable. It has a shallower semicircle and incisions with a greater curvature on both sides. Gravina's conde(after 1989)is similar to Faustino Conde on both sides, but the width of the Media Luna is narrower than the head. Felipe Conde and Mariano Conde have bolder lines of the Media Luna which has deeper semicircle. But Mariano's head is noticeably longer and sharper, like a bull's horn. The incisions on both sides of Felipe's head appear to be anterior and posterior. However Mariano just made two cuts to the surface of the front. These are just some of my superficial observations. I would be glad someone could point out some of my mistakes
Hi Morante, I noticed something about the head of Conde guitars. Faustino Conde's head is the most noticeable. It has a shallower semicircle and incisions with a greater curvature on both sides. Gravina's conde(after 1989)is similar to Faustino Conde on both sides, but the width of the Media Luna is narrower than the head. Felipe Conde and Mariano Conde have bolder lines of the Media Luna which has deeper semicircle. But Mariano's head is noticeably longer and sharper, like a bull's horn. The incisions on both sides of Felipe's head appear to be anterior and posterior. However Mariano just made two cuts to the surface of the front. These are just some of my superficial observations. I would be glad someone could point out some of my mistakes
There was a lot of variation over the years, and dangerous to make assumptions based on that thing. Here is a 1955 Sobrinos de Esteso and also the classical models in the Felipe V catalogue (1990 ish) to compare:
If only these darn things were cut by machine instead of by artisan hand, we could have some consistency?
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ohhh that is a wire head lol. It's my first time to see such a special Media Luna
Yes Ricardo you are right. We should not judge Condes from the head size especially old Condes. But new Condes’ heads look more like they have fixed molds. Whatever.
Again, as the old saying goes here, you have to try it for yourself
ORIGINAL: Morante Pepe de Morao plays a peghead Conde with a very shallow media luna which sounds great. Does the depth of the media luna help to identify the guitar?
Hard to see the guitar clearly in that video. But Pepe de Morao does sometimes play Manuel Morao's old peghead Conde. Some tracing of Morao family Condes being played by different family members here: