It was flamenco guitar which really made me want to become a luthier in the first place, particularly the sound of a flamenco guitar made by David Rubio in the late 1990s: at the time it was the best guitar I’d ever heard, and I was amazed by the sound. After playing that guitar, I decided to make a flamenco guitar for myself and David Rubio very generously offered to teach me… and the rest is history. I don’t make a lot of flamenco guitars at the moment, but it is still my personal favourite type of guitar, and I make them whenever I have a chance or a reasonably plausible excuse.
My flamenco guitars are generally pretty old-school, based on the guitars of Esteso, Hernandez and Barbero. Lightly built guitars, with a “light and dark” tone – lots of presence and brightness with a fast attack, and a lot of depth without too much weight.
2015 flamenco guitar
top: European spruce
back/sides: cypress
neck: African mahogany
fingerboard: ebony
tuners: Schaller
2011 flamenco guitar
top: European spruce
back/sides: cypress
neck: Cedrela
fingerboard: ebony
