This is how I build my guitars.
THE CRAFT · BUILT BY HAND
Each guitar takes me at least a month and a half. I choose the woods myself, listen to every soundboard before I work on it and finish the instruments with shellac using French polishing.
VISIT MY WORKSHOPI start with the wood.
I go to the timber suppliers and choose the wood myself. I can spend days looking until I find a piece that convinces me.
For soundboards I use spruce or cedar. Depending on the guitar, I use cypress, maple, pau ferro, cocobolo and Indian or Madagascar rosewood for the back and sides.
Before I work on a soundboard, I examine it and listen to it. If it doesn't convince me, I set it aside.
The guitar takes shape little by little.
I work on the soundboard, back, sides and neck separately. For much of the process there are loose parts, moulds and half-built guitars on the bench.
Each instrument takes me at least a month and a half. If it needs more time, I give it more time.
I build only a few. Each one takes the time it needs.
I don't repeat the same details every time.
I change woods, patterns and finishing details from one guitar to another. Some have marquetry on the back, olive wood bindings, different rosettes or carved work.
On La Rancia, for example, the rosette was painted in oils by a local artist. On other guitars the design appears on the back, the headstock or around the soundhole.
I finish them with shellac.
I finish the guitars with shellac using French polishing. It is a technique that few guitar makers still use.
When I finish a guitar, it is signed, stamped and numbered.
I was working with wood before I started making guitars.
I started at twelve in a workshop in my town. I learned cabinetmaking with Pepe Rodríguez, a cabinetmaker from Córdoba.
I built the first guitar for myself, copying a friend's instrument. As a guitar maker, I learned on my own.
Read my biographyI work with the sound I'm looking for in mind.
The Córdoba school is my main reference. I have studied instruments by Miguel Rodríguez, Juan Montero and Manuel Reyes. I have also taken references from guitar makers in Granada.
I want power to be the first thing you notice when you hear a guitar.
AT THE BENCH
Parts, tools and work done by hand.
