Official Luthiers Forum!

Joan Pellise' and I worked at adjacent benches at the Romanillos course in Siguenza Spain last summer. He is a talented young luthier and as well he works at the Museo De La Musica in Barcelona Spain which houses this guitar and was kind enough to post this over at the AG forum......since it has not received the appropriate appreciation over there I am taking the liberty to post it here.

"Some time ago I was looking at guitars by the Maestro Torres, including the cardboard guitar. Given that (this guitar) has attracted comments on this list, I would like to make a somewhat detailed description of the instrument.

The soundboard is made with two pieces of spruce and in it's interior it has two harmonic bars with six lateral reinforcements on the sides of the mouth (soundhole) and one "pitch bar?". The range consists of seven longitudinal rods, but does not have the two typical Torres "barraje" (frame or bracing?), but between each of the seven is a little (one) that unites them. It is a truly unprecedented "barraje" in the work of the Maestro. If someone is interested in the scheme, (they) can write and I will send it.

The bottom is internally reinforced by three cross bars and two longitudinal, (which are) much wider and higher than normal, with cedar. The "aros" (rings or hoops? - sorry) have reinforcements along its entire length.

As a curiosity, I think the neck was adapted from some seven-string (at least) guitar, because you see a "pala" (patch?) covering the centrally located (tuner?) hole provided for the pegs. Four of them are original.

As for the use of cardboard in this guitar, personally I think that it is due to finding a material cheaper and easier to work with than wood, all designed to increase sales in "popular" guitars, which were normally built with Cypress , Mahogany , Cherry or Walnut. I do not think in any case that Mr. Antonio tried to prove anything with this instrument, because his conception of the guitar was an indivisible one. If anyone has been able to work with any Torres (guitars), they would understand what I say.

The guitar never left the Torres workshop while he lived, and after his death was acquired by Francisco Tárrega. In turn, when Tarrege died, it was acquired by his most brilliant student: Miquel Llobet.

In other words, this guitar, although modest and fairly punished for the passage of time, was owned by some of the key figures for the development of the instrument during the nineteenth century until 1939, the year of death of Llobet.

I must say that this is not the only cardboard guitar we maintain, because the Museum has another (instrument) attributable to Victoriano Estorch (Barcelona). Besides these, I personally saw three more, all Valencian or Catalan, from the end of the nineteenth century and early twentieth century.

Pardon me once again for my ignorance of English and receive a hug from Catalonia."

Joan Pellisé.

Since Joan posted this in Spanish and the translation above is rather faulty in spots here is his original post.....perhaps someone here with a good knowledge of Spanish vis a vis guitar making can provide a better one......thanks to Joan for providing us with an "in hand" description of this famous guitar!!

Dear friends os the other side of the world. I'm Joan Pellisa, guitar maker from La Fatarella (Tarragona, Spain), and I'm working in Barcelona. I'm sorry, but I can't write correctly in English, so I'll do in Spanish. Thank you if someone can translate.
Hace un tiempo que estoy estudiando guitarras del Maestro Torres, y entre ellas la guitarra de cartón. Visto que ha suscitado comentarios en esta lista, me gustaría hacer una descripción un poco detallada del instrumento. La tapa harmónica está hecha con dos piezas de pinabete (Picea spp.) y tiene en su interior dos barras harmónicas con seis refuerzos laterales de boca y uno de diapasón. El abanico está formado por siete varetas longitudinales, pero no tiene las dos típicas del barraje Torres, sinó que entre cada una de las siete se encuentra una pequeña que las une. Es un barraje realmente inédito en la obra del Maestro. Si alguien está interesado en un esquema puede escribirme y se lo mandaré. El fondo está reforzado interiormente por tres barras transversales y dos longitudinales mucho más anchas y altas de lo normal, y de madera de cedro (Cedrela odorata). Los aros tienen refuerzos en toda su longitud. Como curiosidad, creo que el mástil fue aprovechado de alguna guitarra de almenos siete cuerdas, porque en la pala aparece un agujero central tapado y que condiciona la disposición de las clavijas, cuatro de ellas originales.
El uso del cartón en esta guitarra creo personalmente que se debe a la búsqueda de un material barato y más fácil de trabajar que la madera, todo destinado a aumentar las ventas en guitarras del tipo "popular", normalmente construidas en ciprés (Cupressus sempervirens), caoba (Swietenia spp.), cerezo (Prunus avium) o nogal (Juglans regia). No creo en ningún caso que El señor Antonio intentara demostrar nada con este intrumento, ya que su concepción de la guitarra era de un todo indivisible. Si alguien ha podido trabajar con alguna Torres comprenderá lo que digo.
La guitarra nunca salió del taller de Torres mientras éste vivió, y a su muerte la adquirió Francisco Tárrega. A su vez, cuando murió Tárrega, fue adquirida por su más genial alumno: Miquel Llobet. Es decir, esta guitarra, aunque modesta y bastante castigada por el paso del tiempo, fue propiedad de algunas de las figuras clave para el desarrollo del instrumento durente el siglo XIX hasta 1939, año de muerte de Llobet. Tengo que decir que ésta no es la única guitarra de cartón que conservamos, pues en el Museu tenemos otra atribuible Victoriano Estorch (Barcelona). A parte de éstas, personalmente he podido ver tres más, todas catalanas o valencianas de finales del siglo XIX y principios del XX.
Perdonad una vez más mi ignorancia del inglés y recibid un abrazo desde Catalunya.

Joan Pellisa.


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David,
I have not seen or heard the guitar you are talking about, but it sounds interesting. Just out of curosity, do you know if the paper used in the mache was a wood pulp paper or was it some other form of paper (rice, reed, etc)? I find it amazing that it would stand up for this length of time.

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Reguards,

Ken H

Ken, It's actually a material more like a thick poster board or for those familiar with it, matte board or letramax.
I saw this guitar when it was here in 1991 with an exhibit that was at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It has alway been of interest to luthiers as it was thought to be an illustration of the lack of importance of the back and rims regarding guitar sound....Joan has some interesting observations on this long held belief...........

Great post David, thanks for sharing that with us.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

I know that Joshua visited the museum last year and not only saw the two Torres guitars in their collection, including the 'papier mache' FE14, but also discussed them with Joan, perhaps he'll comment here.

I'm not sure we'll ever know Torres intensions when he made FE14, was he trying to prove something to others, or just to himself, or was he trying to find a cheap alternative to the wood. The problem with that theory was that he could relatively easily obtain the wood for his low end guitars, cypress, walnut locally, the problem he and other instrument makers had was getting good rosewood for the better guitars, so I'm not convinced about the search for a cheap alternative theory. But then I'm often wrong, as my wife will tell you.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

David, thanks a lot for posting this! (aros means sides, abanico = fan)

I too think that finding a cheap alternative might have been one of the reasons for this guitar. Even if cypress was easily available in Spain, all his cypress guitars are made from 3 or even more pieces, the wood is unmatched and often has blemishes.
Also cardboard would not need to be dried, aged, jointed and so on. No problems with humidity and cracks. Todays MDF !

I'm wondering if the interior little 7 struts are not a later addition to help reinforce the plate. The guitar also has a wooden golpeador and I could imagine this might have been one of Llobets flamenco beater / travel guitars etc. It has taken a lot of abuse so it was repaired many times; Romanillos states it is the thinnest Torres soundboard in existence, less than 1mm at the edges. That is veneer like. It's hardly believable Torres made it so thin in the first place.

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Build log

I find it interesting the guitar never left torres shop in his lifetime .. was he being " ashamed" or secretive???? or maybe all the lore boils down to simple ( or maybe not so simple) inventiveness....Jody

More details and a recording of this guitar are available in the "La Chittarra di Liutheria" book by Grondona/Waldner. There is a plan for the top strutting in the introduction. For those who have not seen it, I think this is a great book and worth getting!

/Rob