Here's the 14th episode of the Spartan Project video series. You will see how the luthier Mikaël Springer is doing his fretting on the guitar. It is a very crucial step of the process as the way the frets are dressed is paramount to the quality of the sound and of the comfort of the instrument.
#14 Spartan Project: Fretting
Close up photo of the fretting once finished on the guitar:
Previous episodes of the Spartan Project
The goal of the Spartan Project is to document the building of a guitar for me by luthier Mikaël Springer.
Marco Viola (MOV Guitars) is a luthier based in Italy. He was one of the exhibitors of the guitar show during the 2016 edition of the Guitares au Beffroi festival.
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Yes you can get Slash Guns N'Roses Paradise City sound (or at least get close to it) with the Apollo Twin Universal Audio interface with a couple of plugins and the Burst guitar from luthier Mikaël Springer.
Paradise City sound with the Universal Audio interface and a Springer guitar
It's always a challenge to try to get close to a legendary tone from a hit like Paradise City.
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Luthier Linda Manzer interview at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show
Wednesday, 30 March 2016
Discover in this Linda Manzer interview at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show one of the rare women who is very well known in the luthier world. Linda worked for musicians like Pat Metheny or Carlos Santana just to name those two.
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On this new Luthier Chronicle, I asked Nik Huber the shakespearian question: to relic, or not to relic?
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Luthier Ted Astrand interview at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show
Saturday, 20 February 2016
Here's a Ted Astrand interview done during the 2015 edition of the Holy Grail Guitar Show. Several luthier friends told me to check-out Ted during the show so I listened to their advice and went to meet Ted. His work is really stunning. The guitar presented in Berlin looks both gorgeous and elegant.
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Name : Aquilina Basses
Type : Luthier
Web : www.aquilinabasses.com
Sébastien builds high-quality instrument with a very elegant design which provides a great balance. He exposes regularly at the NAMM and he sells his bass guitars all over the world. if you understand French, you can watch a video of interview of him during the 2016 NAMM in this article.
A couple of Aquilina Basses
The instrument presented during the 2016 Winter NAMM
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Andy Powers interview – Taylor Guitars master builder – NAMM 2016
Monday, 25 January 2016
In this interview, meet Taylor Guitars master builder Andy Powers. Meeting and getting to talk with the luthier involved in the development of all the guitars at Taylor was very interesting to understand more how a huge player in the industry like Taylor operates. In fact Taylor builds around 600 guitars per day with an unsurpassed level of quality in the industry.
Taylor Guitars website: www.taylorguitars.com
Taylor master builder - Adam Powers interview
Here's the full interview with Adam Powers.
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Frank Hartung interview, luthier at the Holy Grail Guitar Show
Saturday, 16 January 2016
Here's a Frank Hartung interview done during the 2014 Holy Grail Guitar Show. He was one of the German luthier exhibiting during the show.
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Lars Rasmussen interview, luthier for Rasmussen Guitars at the Holy Grail Guitar Show
Saturday, 16 January 2016
Here's a Lars Rasmussen interview done during the 2014 Holy Grail Guitar Show. Lars is a Swedish luthier who build high end acoustic guitar.
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Name : Maurice Dupont
Type : Luthier
Web : www.acoustic-guitars.com
Maurice Dupont is one of the great gentleman of the French lutherie. He manufactures guitars surrounded by a team in his workshop near Cognac in France. Well known for his type of gypsy guitar, his production covers a much wider spectrum from classical guitar to solid-body through its famous Manouche guitar or jazz oriented instruments.
You can find his guitars in his Paris store Dupont des Arts (3 Avenue Daumesnil, 75012 Paris France) right next to Bastille and Gare de Lyon.
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Nic Delisle interview – Luthier for Island Manufacture Instrument
Wednesday, 06 January 2016
During my coverage of the 2015 Montreal Jazz Festival I had the pleasure to do a Nic Delisle interview. Nic is a luthier for Island Manufacture Instrument. He is installed in the Montreal island north of downtown in a co-working space with other luthiers. He has a special approach to guitar building with an unorthodox design which is very original.
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Here's an interview with luthier Darko Milojevic from Leo Guitars (www.leoguitars.com) during the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show. Darko has been building guitars for 7 years now so knows what he is talking about and the high quality of his instruments shows it. Reinterpreting the Les Paul theme is not that easy, especially when you want to bring your own special flavour to this timeless classic of the electric guitar.
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Creation of the Spanish luthier association: the CSGB, Contemporary Spanish Guitar Builders
Monday, 21 December 2015
I have recently received a mail from Francisco Rodriguez, luthier for FranFret Guitars, where he told me about the creation of the CSGB, a new association in Spain to gather all the guitar builders, similar to what the EGB (www.europeanguitarbuilders.com) is doing at the European level and the APLG (www.aplg.fr) in France. You can read the press release for the details.
I wish the this new association all the best for the future.
The CSGB can count on The Guitar Channel to be a strong partner for its upcoming projects and initiatives.
Pierre.
Press Release of the CSGB
The past April 4th 2015 a few
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Seth Baccus interview, luthier for Baccus Guitars at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show
Friday, 18 December 2015
Here's a Seth Baccus interview done during the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show. I was very impressed by the quality of the instrument brought by Seth in Berlin (see the photos below).
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Bamboo Ethiq Electric Alquier Guitars, a sustainable instrument built by a luthier
Friday, 11 December 2015
The guitar tested in this video is the electric model Ethiq range presented in Berlin during the 2nd edition of the Holy Grail Guitar Show by luthier Jean-Yves Alquier. The characteristic of this range is that it is made of bamboo from 65% to 100% as in the case of the guitar tested in this video. So this might be one of the first sustainable guitar from a luthier.
We clearly see in the photo below how the body of the guitar is composed.
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Adriano Sergio interview – Ergon Guitars – 2015 Holy Grail Guitar show
Thursday, 03 December 2015
Here's the interview done with Portuguese luthier Adriano Sergio from Ergon Guitars during the second edition of the Holy Grail Guitar Show. I was seduced by the organic shapes of Adriano's guitars and by the quality of the lutherie.
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Luthiers Discussion Panel – 2015 EGB Symposium – Holy Grail Guitar Show
Friday, 20 November 2015
Here is a video document recorded during a panel of luthiers at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show in Berlin in the presence of the following luthiers: Andy Manson A.J. Lucas Jean-Yves Alquier A lady from the Austrian Ministry of the Environment (from memory) Fred Pons Jacky Walraet Chris Larkin Video recording of the panel
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Egon Rauscher interview, Soultool Guitars luthier at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show
Thursday, 12 November 2015
Here's Egon Rauscher interview, luthier for SoulTool Guitars. He was one of the 115 selected guitar builders presenting their work at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show in Berlin. The quality of the instruments from Soultool is top notch as the design which looks pretty cool.
Egon Rauscher interview
This video is publicly accessible because SoulTool has a Pro Backstage Pass
SoulTool website: www.soultool.com
Soultool guitars
My take on the SoulTool guitars
I really dig the design Egon found for his instruments. It's modern but with that classic vibe we all cherish.
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Francisco Rodriguez is the luthier behind FranFret Guitars (www.franfret.net). He was already an exhibitor at Guitares au Beffroi guitar show in France this year but it's at the 2015 Holy Grail Guitar Show in Berlin, Germany that The Guitar Channel took the opportunity to interview him.
Francisco Rodriguez interview from FranFret Guitars
This video is accessible to all because FranFret is a Pro Backstager on The Guitar Channel.
It was still early on that Saturday morning when we did the interview so neither Francisco or I are smiling yet.
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In this new Luthier Chronicle I asked Nik Huber what was his opinion about the Holy Grail Guitar Show which had its first edition in November 2014 in Berlin and which will happen again at the end of this month.
Website of the Holy Grail Guitar show: www.holygrailguitarshow.com/
The Holy Grail Guitar show is an event organized by the luthiers for the luthiers and it makes all the difference.
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On this new Luthier Chronicle, I asked Nik Huber a question to know if he is for or against the CNC machine. Of course he went much further than the basic answer (see the details below).
As a reminder or for your information, CNC means Computer Numerical Control (Wikipedia link). Basically in the guitar world it means that parts of an instrument are built by a machine who will carve the element from a piece of wood or metal.
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Joseph Luttwak is the man behind the Blackbird instruments (www.blackbirdguitar.com).
Joseph Luttwak interview
Until the next interview, keep on playing the guitar!
Pierre.
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On this new Luthier Chronicle, I asked Nik Huber about varnish, finish and paint.
Subjects discussed
Nitro-cellulose versus 2 component finish
His take on the thickness of the finish
Is-it possible to hear the difference between a nitro and a 2 component finish on a solid body?
The development of new colours
His source of inspiration for new ideas
The story of the new metallic finish presented at the 2015 NAMM show
The aging of the finish oh his first guitars
An example of a Krautster II in Gold Top finish
Until the next chronicle, keep on playing your guitar and check-out your
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Chronicle #13 Spartan Project with Springer Guitars – Paint & finish
Wednesday, 05 August 2015
Here's the 13th episode of the Spartan Project video series. You will see how the luthier Mikaël Springer will do his TV white color on the guitar paint. It's quite fascinating to see how it is done.
#13 Spartan Project with @SpringerGuitars: Guitar paint & finish
A few pics from the video
Previous episodes of the Spartan Project
The goal of the Spartan Project is to document the building of a guitar for me by luthier Mikaël Springer.
Let's face it, I don't know much about acoustic guitars. I am definitely more an electric guy. When I prepared my trip to Montréal to cover the Jazz festival, I asked my luthier friends about who I should try to meet while in Québec, the name of Michael Greenfield kept popping up so I contacted him and he accepted right away to have me visit him in his Montréal workshop.
He gave me a full tour of his workshop then we sat down for 40min in-depth video interview.
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Here's the 12th episode of the Spartan Project video series. Mikaël works now on the neck/body ensemble. He finalizes the neck profile, does all the routing for the pickup and electronics and prepares the guitar for the final finish steps.
A few pics from the video
Previous episodes of the Spartan Project
As a reminder, the goal of the Spartan Project is to document the building of a guitar for me by luthier Mikaël Springer.
- Published in News
After a series of 9 videos with Juha Ruokangas in the Luthier Chronicle, I am proposing you a new series with another master builder to share his knowledge of the lutherie world with Nik Huber.
On this first installment I asked Nik about his favorite woods to build instrument.
Until the next chronicle, keep on playing your guitar and check-out your local luthier.
Pierre.
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Here's a Gabor Goldschmidt interview during the 2015 Musikmesse. Gabor is the luthier at Fibenare Guitars. His guitars are played by musician like Tom Quayle who was also present at their booth to demo their instrument.
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In this new chronicle I asked Juha Ruokangas about the CNC machine : is he for a against it?
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