2005 Fritz Ober SP/MP

This 2005 Fritz Ober is a spruce and flamed maple classical guitar made in Munich, Germany, with a new rosette and hand-engraved Alessi tuners.

Hauser-Style Clarity, Honey-Like Warmth

Its sound is reminiscent of the "Spanish-style" Hauser I guitars that we have seen – great clarity, balance and transparency, but also a very lyrical, warm quality, particularly in the trebles. A deeper body resonance makes the tone darker and a bit mysterious, while the maple adds a honey-like glow and none of the edginess of a rosewood guitar.

Rosette, Snakewood and Engraved Tuners

Aesthetically, this instrument is stunning, with a beautiful new rosette and snakewood accents throughout – between the flamed maple of the back and sides, on the head veneer and binding, and on the machine-head buttons. The hand-crafted Alessi tuning machines have hand-engraved plates and matching snakewood buttons, and the spruce top has some very elegant bearclaw in the grain.

Orfeo Magazine No. 4: Hauser III, Blöchinger and Ober

Fritz Ober (1955–2020): From Rosenheim to Munich

Fritz Ober was born in 1955 in Rosenheim, Germany, and spent his youth in the small village of Übersee am Chiemsee, where he learned to play the guitar and discovered an early love for woodworking. He built his first guitars mainly for himself, learning largely from books, then served a two-year apprenticeship with Helmut Buchsteiner – at the time the only known luthier in Upper Bavaria besides Hermann Hauser II – before opening his own workshop in Munich.

Old-World Methods and the Great Masters

In Munich he found surprising demand for pre-Torres instruments such as Panormo-style guitars and Renaissance lutes. Through Robert Lundberg, a leading expert on historical stringed instruments, he learned the methods of the old masters: working without machinery or sandpaper, with natural hide glues and resins, and with hand-split spruce – he even sought out his own trees in the nearby Alps. Soon he was restoring some of the most important guitars in Europe's great collections, by Torres, Hauser I, Santos Hernández, Manuel Ramírez, Esteso, Simplicio, Bouchet, Friederich and Fleta, among others.

The Torres/Hauser I Tradition

What he learned from these masters shaped his own style, and for the rest of his career Fritz built almost exclusively in the Torres/Hauser I tradition, aiming, in his words, to "create the deep and profound singing qualities of the Spanish tradition (Torres), combined with the harmonic clarity, evenness and transparency of Hauser I." Working alone, he made only 10–12 instruments a year, and his players included the Romeros, Wulfin Lieske, Jürgen Ruck, Earl Klugh, John Ingwerson, Doug Rubio and Andy Summers. GSI was Fritz Ober's exclusive US dealer during his lifetime.