Measuring the Checchucci Guitar at Boston MFA

This evening I'm in Boston having finished the first day of measuring the baroque guitar by Jacopo Checchucci, Livorno, 1628. Tomorrow I'll be back in the museum making templates of the arching of the back and recording things that I missed today. Several factors have bought me here. First for an Italian guitar, I've been building an anonymous model  since 1994. Although it has been successful for me, I thought it was time for a change. Second, I've been attending the Boston Early Music Festival for years, either as an exhibitor or just going to shows. While here I've visited the Museum of Fine Arts and admired their Checchucci guitar (acquired in 2002).

I emailed curator Darcy Kuronen to set up a visit. Darcy explained that even though the guitar is one of the few intact, nearly original Italian guitars from the first half of the 17th century, few builders have expressed an interest in it and no one has measured it. You can see from these two photos that it is an ornate guitar. But it is more than that. It is a comfortably sized guitar. The body measures 46 cm long with a string length of only 63 cm on a 10 fret neck. Stretched to 11 frets it is still 65 cm. Perfect.

I think it is rare to find a guitar that combines a beautiful aesthetic that is well crafted with important acoustical elements. The back  has a very high arch and the side ribs are angled inward around the  circumference of the body. I'm sure this will make an interesting model.

Both of these features are visible in the photo at right.

Kuronen is concerned about the securing the long term documentation of these instruments. It is one thing to display them to the public as artifacts but quite another to make them and drawings  of them available to interested builders to turn into living musical instruments. Darcy has arranged with a musical instrument draftsman to record important instruments in their collection.

 In the meantime, you can visit the MFA collection online at:
http://www.mfa.org/node/4475

Scroll through the thumbnails to find the Checchucci guitar, a Berr baroque lute, an Alexander Voboam guitar and many other interesting instruments.  The Checchucci is in playable condition. Audio files of the it and the Voboam, recorded by Olav Chris Henriksen, are available on the these pages.

I will make my report on this guitar along with measurements and more photos available on this blog in the near future.

Repairing Lutes and Guitars

It is inevitable that my instruments are damaged in one way or another. I expect to have one in my shop at any given time, but my clients are having a run of bad luck over the last few weeks. Here's the casualty list, all with loose bars caused by age or careless baggage handlers; 1983 ten course, baroque guitar, large Schelle model theorbo and most recently, as a rush item, a small theorbo with .... loose bars.

The story of the ten course is interesting. It was built by my early apprentice, Bruce Duncan. Bruce went on to study in England and returned to build lutes. This was one of them. He is no longer involved with lutes but stills builds early instruments - analog synthesizers.

 The damaged lute has had its belly lifted numerous times over the years. This procedure takes a toll on the wood fibres around the edge where it is attached to the side ribs. This is a photo of the area above the bridge on the treble side. You can clearly see the damage that repeated repairs has caused. I did not look forward to removing the belly again but I decided to take it off and then to completely renew the edge. Here is how I did it.

There was damage similar to this around the rear edge of the belly continuing up to the third bar on the bass side. The procedure to repair this type of damage requires that the inside damaged edge of the belly be removed to a uniform width and depth and then filled with a splint of wood of similar grain direction and structure.

I removed the three harmonic bars and the finger bars that support the underside of the bridge and made a template to guide my router. This is a handy machine. It is smaller and more manageable than many routers but more sturdy and accurate than the Dremel Tool. It is called a laminate trimmer and its industrial use is to remove the overhanging veneer or laminate that occurs in the fabrication of counter tops, shelves, etc. The 1/4 inch thick  plywood template  allows the circular base of the router to move freely, smoothly and precisely around the edge of the belly at a set depth. Just enough wood is removed to expose the underside of ebony half binding (left side of above photo) that encircles the edge of the belly.

Then I cut thin pieces of spruce and shape them to fit snuggly in the routed channel. I glue them in place with hot hide glued, secured with painter's tape and sandwiched between layers of plexiglass. The inserted pieces of spruce are allowed to dry then they are levelled flush with the surface of the belly and the harmonic bars and fingers are glued back in their original places.

Here is the result after everything is done. This is a lightly built lute that gets a lot of use. I think it is good for another 30 years.

To a greater or lesser degree I carried out this procedure on the other instruments. It is frightening to use the router for such a delicate operation. But if care is taken and the set-up is well thought out it does the job very nicely.

All of these repairs have taken time and a toll on me. Although they are necessary and appreciated I would rather be building new lutes. 

I have started the mould for a triple nut baroque lute after the A. Jauch in Copenhagen. Very shortly I will begin to describe building the mould and then follow through with posts concerning the construction of the entire lute. 

The last week of April I'll be at the Boston Fine Arts Museum to measure the Checchucci guitar. 

http://www.mfa.org/search/collections?keyword=checchucci

Building a Voboam Guitar - The "Rope" Banding

Museé de la musique E.2087

If there is one characteristic feature of French baroque guitars and those built by the Voboam family in particular it is the "rope" banding. The effect is pleasing even in the simpler form that I use. The example by Jean Voboam (right) is one of the more elaborate treatments.

Jan Vermeer 1672
Kenwood House

Vermeer's use of the motif in his iconic painting, The Guitar Player (left) is stunningly vibrant. This is my favorite "guitar" painting and I included this image because painters in the 17th century began to present guitars seriously in their work. Many of then used the Voboam as a model. I saw Vermeer's painting several years ago after examining lutes at nearby Fenton House. Sunlight was streaming through a nearby window and I couldn't see the subtle detail in the painting until the docent drew the curtains to put the painting in the shade. Then I could see that Vermeer had used bold brush strokes on the light colored banding to create the effect of individual threads woven into the "rope"!

Kenwood House is definitely worth a visit if you are in London. Walk across The Heath from Hampstead and enjoy the splendid views of open fields and the distant city. Lunch in the Brew House is a treat. http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/kenwood-house/

The technique for making the rope banding is not that difficult but it does require sitting up a jig to accurately cut the  lozenges.

I took a piece of plywood and accurately duplicated the contour of the guitar belly. Then I routed a channel in the edge the same width as the banding that I planned to use and deep enough to accommodate two pieces of material that I had prepared; one each of holly and ebony. These I bent carefully and while still warm bound them in the channel of my jig to thoroughly dry.

The next photo shows the cutting of the individual lozenges. I had measured and marked 9mm intervals along the edge of the jig and drawn tangents of about 20 degrees from the perpendicular.

Following these lines I cut through the two pieces of banding into the jig itself. After each cut I inserted a thin clock spring scraper into the previous slot in order to prevent the banding material from shifting; thus ensuring that the lozenges were exactly the same length. I carefully and securely put each pair of lozenges aside in sequence.

Gluing the lozenges in place with hot hide glue is actually the easy part. Since the strips of banding were carefully bent and the shape was accurately cut and the pieces were not mixed up, the lozenges  fit snuggly in place. I added a narrow band of black-white material that was glued in at the same time.

Allow this all to dry thoroughly and level carefully with files.

*** 

All images on this site other than those so labeled are by the author. Readers are welcome to use my material with attribution. For other images I have endeavored to accurately attribute copyrighted material.

If any copyright holder wishes me to withdraw their material I will do so.

schreiner@sympatico.ca

Building a Voboam Baroque Guitar - The Barring

Unshaped barring on the Voboam(left) and
the beginning of a Lacôte (right).

I always put a lot of thought into the barring pattern that I will use on a new instrument. Although all parts of an instrument work together and influence the tone production the barring is the single most important element. Even if I have built a particular model many times I will alter the barring pattern from one instrument to the next, sometimes to accommodate the playing style of a particular client and other times to appease my curiosity and need to experiment. Whatever I  choose to do the decision is always firmly based on historical precedent as far as that is possible to interpret.

Unlike the record of historical lute construction that is now well documented, the same level of interest in the baroque guitar has only recently begun to develop. My own research has focused on the exterior of conserved guitars, by necessity, because their interiors are seldom accessible. At best, x-rays are available  and occasionally technical drawings. There are two sources that I find valuable for historical information on Voboam guitars. The website of  Daniel Sinier and Françoise de Ridder; http://sinierderidder.free.fr/ records their restoration of historic instruments with text and photographs, including their work on Voboam guitars.

Florence Gétreau

 The chapter, René, Alexandre et Jean Voboam: des  factures pour "La guitarre Royalle" by Florence Gétreau in the book, Instrumentistes et Luthiers Parisiens XVII-XIX Siècles, edited by the same author, includes this diagram of the barring pattern that survives in several guitars by various members of the Voboam dynasty. In this work are descriptions  and  measurements of twenty-nine guitars from the various members of the Voboam family including drawings of peghead designs and other aesthetic details. This is essential reading for anyone interested in building models of Voboam guitars.

On previous models I have used number 5 and number 8. But liking to experiment, I was intrigued by number 9 -- although I was worried that the treble side would be too firm.  I have a photo of the inside of the belly of this guitar but I dithered for some time unable to make up my mind. The diagonal extends beyond the bridge line and a finger bar is used for even more reinforcement. Wouldn't that be too stiff?

photo by Thomas Georgi

Then, I realized that the finger bars are tiny and must be intended as a kind of secondary moderator. The diagonal, low and sort of fat and very rounded on the top is shaped very much like a violin bass bar. And, I think, serves the same purpose of providing an element of localized stiffness without adding a lot of mass.

The player who ordered this instrument intends to play with nails (artificial ones glued on at a salon) so I knew that it would take a stiff, regulated belly to stand up to that kind of attack.

Here's the finished belly ready to be glued to the ribs. I have been making diagrams of the bellies of my lutes and guitars for 30 years so I have a record that I can consult form instrument to instrument. Here I've written the measurements on the spruce. I'll copy those on a tracing of the belly, draw in the bar positions and list their height. The measurements are in thousands of an inch.

Note that the diagonal falls well below the bridge line that is visible  just below the top of the finger bars. The diagonal tapers from 6mm wide and 10.2mm high in the centre toward each end where it is 5.5mm wide and 7.5mm high. The fingers are 5mm wide and 6 mm high at the back edge tapering to 0 just beyond the bridge line. The belly is basically 2.4mm thick over-all, thinning a little through the waist area.

***
 All images on this site other than those so labeled are by the author. Readers are welcome to use my material with attribution. For other images I have endeavored to accurately attribute copyrighted material.
If any copyright holder wishes me to withdraw their material I will do so.

schreiner@sympatico.ca

Building a Voboam Baroque Guitar -- The Rosette

The last post in this series was February 8. The lozenge--shaped elements that form the rosette and border the soundboard are a distinctive feature of Voboam guitars. I can't image building a Voboam model without including this design feature. It is not as difficult as it looks. In this post I will describe a simple mechanical system for laying--out the design of the rosette border and an equally simple method for cutting and assembling the elements.

I lay -- out the design with a compass and ruler on a scrap piece of soundboard spruce. Since the spruce will serve as a backing for the rosette it is a logical material to use. First, I scribe a circle with a circumference greater than the finished design. Then I divide the circle into 24 equal segments that represent twelve white and twelve black lozenges by using a protractor to mark segments of 15 degrees each. A greater or smaller number of segments could be chosen.  I scribe a smaller circle that will determine the angle of the sides of the lozenge. The larger this circle is the more angled the lozenge will appear. The smaller circle is not marked off into segments.  I draw a line with a ruler from each point on the large circle to a tangent on the smaller circle. The last element of the design is to scribe the two circles that represent the finished rosette.

The individual elements are cut from strips of ebony and holly that I thickness to about 1.5mm. The spacers are prepared with black-white purfling material. When I first made this rosette I constructed a miniature mitre--box to duplicate the two angles. However, the angles in the mitre box were slightly wrong. This didn't manner in assembling the first few pieces but the error multiplied and became significant. Finally I was making so many adjustments to the cut pieces and to the mitre-box that I scraped it and started cutting the lozenges "free-hand". In this method the first cut is always the same angle and can be marked with a gauge. The angle of the second cut is determined by the next segment line. Even if this cut proves to be slightly inaccurate the lozenge can still be used because the correction can be made on the next lozenge. This design is so "busy" visually that slight imperfections are unnoticeable. Note also that the material that I cut the lozenges from is wide enough that there is an excess of material on each side of the finished design. This is intentional. If I happen to make a lozenge too small or too large I can still achieve a proper fit by moving it in or out from the center. I glue each piece in place with hot hide glue holding it in position with a push pin and spring clamp. I am in no hurry when I assemble one of these so every so often during my work day I will make and glue a lozenge. This method suits my work habits. It depends on the spontaneous accuracy of hand and eye rather than mechanical repetition.

Once all of the pieces are in place I clean up the surface
of the design and carefully and accurately cut it free
from the excess scrap using a small router. The spruce
backing protects the rosette and keeps it intact during
this operation. I then rout a cavity in the soundboard for the rosette to sit in.  Members of the Voboam family used a variety of designs around the outer edge of the rosette including thin black and white purfling material that I favor. I then thin out the spruce backing and glue the rosette in its recess.


There is a very useful article by Florence Gétreau on the various construction elements found in the guitars of the Voboam family including a list of barring patterns. In my next post on this guitar I will lay-out the pattern and explain several options that I have used previously.

Lacôte 10 String Guitars in Paris

author's photo

Yesterday I visited the Musée de la musique  in Paris to examine two Lacôte 10 string guitars -- decacordes, as they are known, numbers E. 1040 and E. 986.5.1. I have been interested in the pre-classical guitar since my earliest years of building instruments but the era has occupied only a niche for me. Lately, thing have changed. I have lute clients who are interested in the music for accompanying singers and /or for exploring the virtuosic repertoire. It is not just a question of having the appropriate instrument, but of understanding what the period was all about, sound-wise. Many makers built multi-string guitars and I am intrigued by their work. Obviously, the addition of extra strings create imbalances, structural and tonal. These two guitars represent several solutions.

The guitar, in the foreground, is anonymous but built in the style of Lacôte. It is as meticulously built and with excellent materials. Museum curator, Joël Dugot, suggested that Lacôte may have allowed his employees to build guitars for personal sale. Perhaps this is an example of one. The guitar in the background is a Lacôte. This guitar presents a very elegant solution to the problem of weight that such a wide neck produces. The guitar also displays a lever mechanism for the changing the pitch of the diapasons. The treatment of both of these issues in the construction of the anonymous guitar is more utilitarian. You can see photos and descriptions of these guitars on the museum's website at: http://mediatheque.cite-musique.fr/masc/ .  I will report my finding to you at a future date.

As always, Joël Dugot's assistance during my visit was generous and informative. Thank you.

Marx Unverdorben Lutes in Barcelona

A wall size caricature of Issac Albéniz greets staff and
visitors at the museum's documentation center

Lute makers always seem to be curious about "new" models -- neglected instruments in museums' storage or ones that surface from private collections arouse an understandable degree of interest. Not that long after I started building lutes an article appeared in the LSA Journal that described lutes in a Barcelona  museum; John Griffiths, “The Lutes in the Museo Municipal de Música in Barcelona”. Journal of the Lute Society of America12(1979): 48-66.  One of them, a seven course, built in the  sixteenth century by Marx Unverdorben was reported to be in original condition. From that time on I have been fascinated with Unverdorben and his work. He and his lutes are  enigmatic. I had difficulty in tracking him down. Little is known of his life -- there may have been two Unverdorbens -- and his lutes represent styles that include early renaissance nine rib models and later multi-rib types. My interest in the Barcelona Unverdorben was hampered by the fact that  the museum has had three homes since Griffiths' article appeared. Things started to come together last year when a web search turned up his website:
http://www.vihuelagriffiths.com/JohnGriffiths/Home.html
I got in touch and an exchange of emails dissolved time, distance and language barriers. I was able to arrange an appointment to examine not only the original Unverdorben seven course but also an Unverdorben theorbo (?) fragment. My appointment was yesterday!

Here is what I found. In the foreground is the seven course. The string length is 67cm and the bowl is 33cm wide to give you an idea of its size. The thirteen ribs are bird's-eye maple. The second lute, in three parts, appears to be a small theorbo, but only a stump of the original neck survives so it is difficult to be sure. Also, the label dates the lute to 1581! The ivory bowl is badly damaged on the treble side, the neck block and neck stump are detached from the bowl, but the belly is nearly intact and the barring appears unaltered. The treatment of the bars is very interesting. I am looking forward to studying my drawings and notes and sharing my findings with you.

I am grateful to Oriol Rossinyol, Co-director of the Museu de la Música and his staff for the warm welcome and generous support they showed me during my visit. I especially want to thank John Griffiths for helping to make this possible.

Click on the "Online catalogue" on this page to search the museum's collection:
http://www.bcn.cat/museumusica/en/LesColeccions.html