1867 Antonio de Torres SP/MP

This instrument was built in 1867, towards the end of the so-called "first epoch" while Torres was still working in Seville. Numbered by Jose Romanillos as FE24, this guitar was once owned by Roberto Ramaugé of Buenos Aires who had been a student of several famous guitarists including Domingo Pratt, Miguel Llobet and Andres Segovia. It was also formerly housed in the Sheldon Urlik collection and featured on pages 2-5 of the 2nd edition of his book.

Torres clearly built this guitar as one of his more "premium instruments" - it is highly decorated and uses choice materials including a four-piece back of birds-eye maple with black fillet strips in the seams. The soundboard is made from two unmatched pieces of spruce joined under the third string. The bridge is made of rosewood and has, in each wing, a decorative checkerboard square matching those in the rosette. Neck and head are made from Cuban cedar. The headstock veneer is made from African ebony and is inlaid with a "meander pattern" in the central strip. Tuning machines were replaced with a set made by Rodgers of England for functionality however the original tuning machines remain with the guitar. It is a full-sized instrument, completely "modern" by todays standards in terms of measurements and proportions which incredibly, remain the blueprint for all guitar makers ever since, with little to no modification from this basic design to the present day. This instrument is currently in excellent, concert-ready condition thanks to a careful ane well-executed restoration job done several years ago by luthier Alan Perlman, who removed the back to properly access the underside of the top, back and sides (the tornavoz makes working through the soundhole almost impossible). While doing so he also replaced one of the sides with a piece that beautifully complements the original materials.

Sound is squarely that of the old-world... and that which has haunted luthiers ever since in their quest to tap into the "Torres sound". It has a velvety texture, rich in concentrated overtones yet retaining great clarity at the core of every note. The body resonance is very deep, partly due to a device Torres used with some regularity - especially in the first epoch (including most famously in such guitars as "La Leona", FE08, FE13 ex Llobet, FE17 ex Tarrega and others) called a "tornavoz" - a conical tube attached to the soundhole, which in this guitar adds a sonic boom to the bottom end and gives the trebles a brilliant, sparkling clarity. All-in this is a wonderful instrument, constructed with a level of artistry and craftsmanship that Torres reserved for his very best and most expensive works.

For more information on the life of Antonio de Torres, be sure to read this short biography and this excerpt about the Torres sound from the Jose Romanillos book, "Antonio de Torres". We also have an interview between Pepe Romero and Kenny Hill about the master luthier.

Orfeo Magazine #9 - The 200th Anniversary of Antonio de Torres

The name of Antonio de Torres (1817-1892) is to guitarists what the name of Antonio Stradivari is to violinists. Taken as a whole, the corpus of instruments made by this legendary maker’s hand are today regarded as the foundational basis of the modern guitar. The impact that these guitars made on successive generations of luthiers is impossible to exaggerate – still to this day, most or nearly all of Torres’ structural and tonal improvements are still in use by all top contemporary builders. In Torres’ own day, the leading players such as Julian Arcas and Francisco Tarrega were already performing on his masterpieces, and successive generations of players over the 20th century continued to play them. Although increasing values on Torres over the past several decades has resulted in their placement largely within sphere of collectors, they are still highly desirable to leading professional players and occasionally make their way into the recording studio or even concert stage. Pepe Romero, Stefano Grondona, Wulfin Lieske and Marc Teicholz, among others, have brought them to life in recorded and live sound and we all hope this trend continues in the future, especially as more Torres instruments come to the public’s attention.