2012 Graciliano Pérez SP/CY

This 2012 Graciliano Pérez is a spruce and cypress flamenco blanca from Córdoba, Spain – a featherweight guitar with enormous power, photographed in the making.

Friend of the Rodríguez Family

More and more great players have been turning up with Graciliano's guitars, Vicente Amigo among them – he has already bought several of his flamencos (see Vicente playing his latest Graciliano cedar negra here). Miguel Rodríguez, whose guitars strongly influence Graciliano's, was his friend.

A Light, Powerful Blanca

This spruce blanca is lightly built and feather-like in weight, yet it has enormous power and projection. Its snappy, snare-drum punch is startlingly reminiscent, in sound and playability, of an older Reyes – also from Córdoba – from the '60s and early '70s, and it has all the character and style of the great Andalusian flamencos of the last hundred years.

Photos of this guitar being built

Graciliano Pérez: Flamenco and Classical Guitar Maker of Córdoba

Graciliano Pérez (Graciliano Pérez Carrizosa, b. 1955) was born in Puertollano, in the province of Ciudad Real, and moved to Córdoba at the age of 9. He began to play the guitar at 11, and that is when he met the great luthier Miguel Rodríguez Beneyto – the Rodríguez workshop was on his street – and began a friendship with the Rodríguez family that would last a lifetime. He learned from the family directly, studied their guitars in great depth, and still uses woods he bought from Rodríguez for some of his guitars. He also took classes at the Córdoba Conservatory with the great guitarist and teacher Manuel Cano.

The Córdoba School, from Vicente Amigo to Today

His guitars carry the aesthetic of the Córdoba school – his own rosettes that harmoniously combine color and design, a silhouette with an accented curve and a particularly comfortable neck – built the traditional Spanish way on a solera rather than in a mould, from woods at least 25 years old, and French polished. They have found their way into the hands of Vicente Amigo, who recorded his album "Tierra" with them, as well as Raimundo Amador and Eduardo Trassierra. In 2017 Graciliano was honored at Córdoba's Noche Blanca del Flamenco, and today he builds together with his brother José Antonio Pérez Carrizosa in their workshop on Calle Estonia, in Córdoba's Tecnocórdoba business park.