Posts filed under '2006 Newport Guitar Festival'
Todd Cambio, who builds under the Fraulini name, had four guitars he made in the ladder brace-syle of the old Stellas from the 1920s. The photo on the left shows the back of a smaller guitar that he made out of oak, a tonewood that was used frequently in the 1920s. (It would look nice in a living room full of Stickley mission-style furniture.) His 12-string was based on some drawings Dan Erlewine made of Leadbelly’s famous guitar. This was a very difficult guitar to photograph because every time we passed Todd’s table someone was playing it. Check out those gears. Todd has them custom made in Italy.-MJS
August 16th, 2006
Bernie Lehmann had a nice assortment of flattops, archtops and Selmer-style guitars. On the left he also had a guitar with an interesting back made of fluted staves, which was sort of like a giant bowl-back mandolin. He also had a nice Maccaferri-style travel guitar with a removable neck. It’s just the sort of thing for playing the music of those legendary travellers, the Gypsies.-MJS
August 16th, 2006
Judy Threet drove down from Calgary to show off her elegant guitars. Check out the hippo inlay waddling down the fretboard in the middle shot. The shot on the right shows an inlay of a hawksbill turtle, which is on the headstock of the first guitar she built out of Brazilian rosewood. Judy said that she felt it was appropriate to use the image of one endangered species on a guitar made out of another.-MJS
August 15th, 2006
Paul Norman of Forbidden Fruit Guitars had a pair of jumbo resophonics and an archtop on display. The Bat Out of Hell on the left featured decorative elements made of bloodwood, of course. The archtop boasts lizard-shaped soundholes and is called the Art Gecko. The rattlesnake guitar doesn’t have a name, but it sure looks nice. Norman is something of an inventor and he’s come up with a carbon fiber biscuit and bridge for National-style cones.-MJS
August 10th, 2006
By late Sunday, some of the luthiers seemed to get a little crazier than usual.-MJS
August 9th, 2006
Allied Lutherie was on hand with some nice tonewoods. I guess these stacks of Brazilian rosewwod, spruce, maple, ebony and cedar are guitars in their larval form.-MJS
August 9th, 2006
We all know that Kevin Ryan’s guitars have a huge following. Most of us also know that they’re some of the best-built guitars around (and some of the most expensive). But, upon seeing a few close-ups, we had a question: What’s with the serial number? Kevin Ryan spilled the beans for us. The first number (before the hyphen) is the sequential number of what Ryan it is (in this case his 566th guitar). The second number is the year it was built, minus the number 44. Why 44? Because it’s the jersey number for Los Angeles Laker legend Jerry West! Who knew?!? (Click on the pic to enlarge it and see the label clearly.) -JV
August 6th, 2006
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