Saturday, August 31, 2019

A visit from Phil

This week, friend and guitarist extraordinaire, Phil Hare paid a visit to Amanda and I. As well as a good old catch up, he brought over a recently acquired 1955 Martin 0-18 for me to have a look at and possibly do some restoration work on.
As you can see from the photos it’s had a hard life and it would be interesting to hear the tales it could tell. There’s no doubt that it would be an interesting project for someone who wants to painstakingly take it apart, make a new soundboard, re-build it and give it a new lease of life. But, to be honest I’ve never really enjoyed repair work, much preferring to build from scratch, so unfortunately, I had to pass on this one.
Whilst here, Phil kindly gave us his latest CD, A Stranger I Came. It makes you realise that he is not only a brilliant guitar player but a very talented song-writer too. And of course, he plays his Nava guitar throughout, which is always a great thrill for us to hear.
If you want to see Phil live, he is playing at March Town Hall on 26th Oct 2019. This will be his 8th annual Under The Bridge concert that he and Steph promote and also appearing will be Ken Nicol (The Albion Band and Steeleye Span). It promises to be great night. You can find out everything you need to know about Phil on his website and maybe treat yourself too.

Wednesday, August 14, 2019

Beginning of the end

For various reasons that I shan’t bore you with, progress in the ‘shop has been a bit slow recently. However, I’m finally managing to crack-on with the finish on the archtop. This one is being French polished and you can see how the finish really pops the grain.

For me, French polishing is a slow process so it’s going to be a good few weeks before archtop #3 is complete and ready for sale.

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