It is advisable to hand plane tops as opposed to putting them through the agressive drum sanders that are often used for the hardwoods.  Regardless of how you take the thickness down though, the last steps have to be taken in such a way as to guarantee the flatness and the uniformity of the top.  Even if you work the top to varying thicknesses at different points the transitions must be very gradual so that glueing surfaces can be made perfect.  Abrupt variations in thickness in a plate which is clamped between a mold and a bar will result in a joint with weak spots prone to vibration and cracking.   In short you need flat surfaces on each side of the finished top whether  these two surfaces are perfectly parallel and equidistant or not.  The best way to assure flatness is to use a toothing plane.  This tool makes marks on the high spots and leaves the low spots untouched.  The high spots are then removed with a cabinet scraper and the process is repeated.  Depending on how agressive the set of the plane is you will also be removing some material as you plane.  When the plane makes uniform marking over the entire surface it will be perfectly flat.  Careful sanding or scraping of the entire surface to remove the marks (but no more) will ensure that it remains flat.  This first surface is best achieved while the plate is still quite thick, otherwise the unevenness of the opposite side can affect the results.  Once one face is smooth and flat it can be placed on a very flat surface and the uneven side can be thicknessed and then flattened in the same way.  This photo shows a low spot which is not marked, and therefore more reflective, the surrounding area must be scraped and then the entire face planed again.  Below you can see the parallel marks from the teeth which show that the blade is registering everywhere.

The most important part of making and bracing a top is good glue joints and this technique will help you get those.

Quite recently I was contacted by a film-maker and a guitar-maker (both american) about a project they had begun which would bring them to Granada to film a guitar being made here along with some footage which was to deal with the history of Granada and the spanish guitar’s deep, deep roots here.   I felt that even though the focus didn’t seem to be on the Granada guitar, the makers and their history, if I could push it that way just a little it might be worth our while.  In this spirit I agreed to lend a hand where I could.   Here is the project website where they can tell you their own story.  The film-maker is Sky Sabin and the guitar-maker is Steve Connor. The film will be very interesting without a doubt but there will be plently left to tell in the documentary about the Granada makers which remains to be made.  Any takers for that job?

Mother-of-pearl can add something very special to the decoration of a guitar but working with it is a pain.  You can’t scrape, plane or chisel it and it can’t be incorporated into projects like making ten rosettes at once.  As I have so often said before, the successful craftsman relies on efficency to make a half-decent living and to make enough instruments to allow him to become more profficient.  One way around this problem with M.O.P. is to use a spacer.  I have posted photos before of my strips that I make of with the central motif.  I can slice the strips off and bundle them with the herringbone and veneers and install them in one go.  The plastic spacer is popped out once the top is thicknessed and the M.O.P. can be glued in and sanded down flush.

I was approached recently by someone who wants to sell this guitar and had asked at Casa Parramon for an appraisal of this instrument.  She was told to contact me and I asked to see it.  The guitar belonged to an aficionado who really knew his guitars and had two Santos and a number of other great guitars.  This family was host to Alirio Díaz, Regino Sainz de la Maza and other great guitarists when they were in Granada.  These are the evenings of music that sparked the interest of a young Antonio Marín Montero. It is not surprising that this guitar was chosen among many as it is a great one.

Manuel de la Chica is often touted as the best maker that Granada has ever produced and while I don’t necessarily agree with that I do place him very high on the list.  It should be stated, however, that some part of his later production was made up of guitars made by Antonio Marín and Manuel Bellido which de la Chica sold under his own label (according to Marín and Bellido).  He may also have done that with Germán Pérez Barranco and Francisco Manuel Díaz as they were disciples of his.  De la Chica was to a large degree self-taught but claims to have examined the guitars of Santos Hernández and based his early work on those instruments.  Richard Bruné’s observations that de la Chica’s guitars were often given false labels so that they could be sold as Santos guitars lends support to this.  I have seen a number of guitars by both makers and the similarities are striking.  Those makers here in Granada who remember de la Chica hold him up as standard of organization, craftsmanship and inventiveness; the hallmarks of the artisan. For a bit more on the man who made this guitar see this newspaper article from 1947.

This guitar was expertly restored by Manuel Bellido some years ago to deal with two cracks in the top and one in the back.  The geometry of the guitar is healthy and I think will continue to be a very playable instrument for many years. Update, this guitar has been sold.