Wood can be beautiful, striking or combined very nicely for a particular project but what a woodworker really loves is a wood which responds well to the tools. This particular piece planes like a dream, takes a beautiful shine upon scraping and has a nice compact structure. It even smells wonderful. I would love to leave this guitar unvarnished but then the beauty of the wood would quickly be marred by staining and ageing.

The guitar concerts at the Palacio de Gomérez have taken on a new aspect with the duets we heard on Friday evening thanks to Marcus Toscano and Bernardo Rambeaud. You can see them both playing at the end of this video. The concert wrapped up with a few pieces for mandolin and guitar which made for a refreshing change.

As you may have seen here, Marcus Toscano is performing on a regular basis at a chapel which has been converted to a bar. This Thursday we will present my copy of Santos Hernández 1924 which once belonged to Andrés Segovia.