Gallery: Story of the Strad |
This is a copy of a guitar made in 1680 (or 1688 - no one is sure of the exact date) by Antonio Stradivari. But is not an exact copy.
Before I began, Mike Tildesley who commissioned it, and I, had a long discussion about what sort of sound he was looking for. I did research at the Horniman Museum which has one of the best collections of musical instruments in Britain and went to see the Strad in the Ashmolean in Oxford.
And I got to play several 18th century guitars owned by James Westbrook.
We agreed that I would make some changes to Strad design. I built a copy of the neck/heel Stradivari used (it has a 4 inch nail in it) and tested it to destruction. The join broke at 26 kilos. So I adapted a Spanish style neck/body join to look like the Strad join.
I also moved the bridge to the centre of the soundboard, made a slightly thicker board and braced it.
The result is a guitar that has much of the beautiful sound quality of the old guitars I played but is much louder.
I believe that a guitar like this with metal frets, nylon strings and modern tuning would make a delightful, easy to play guitar.
Click on a picture below for a larger view:
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