2025 Valerio Licari "Lesna - Special Edition" SP/ZR

This is a fantastic guitar from Valerio Licari, now living and working in Turin, Italy. Although thoroughly "Spanish" in its build, the aesthetic details on this guitar are drawn from Valerio's Italian roots. This new "special edition" model, which he calls "Lesna" has the same body shape and detailing that is found in his "Albayzín" model, but with a new, modified 6-fan bracing system internally. Our immediate response when tuning the guitar up and playing it upon arrival was that it does not feel like a "new" spruce. It's very loose and responsive - the sound literally jumps out of it with great ease, and it has a great blend of overtones & clarity. It's an extremely fun and satisfying guitar to play - very hard to put down!

Like some of his previous builds, his choice of detailing for this guitar is inspired by the famous "Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore" in Florence (see photos in gallery) which has particulary influenced the decorative motifs found in the rosette and tie-block (what Valerio calls his "Florentine design" which uses maple, sycamore and rosewood), giving the guitar a very satisfying "architectural" look. Materials used are Italian spruce for the soundboard (aged 20 years) matched with a set of AAA-quality ziricote for the back and sides (the 12-hole bridge is also ziricote). Neck is of Honduran cedar (with internal carbon fiber reinforcement) and it has an ebony fingerboard with 20 frets and compound radius. Tuning machines are by Alessi - his "Hauser" style with ebony knobs. The guitar is finely French polished. Overall, this is simply a stunning instrument. His instruments have been played most-notably by Pat Metheny and Charlie Burchill, to name a couple of well-known guitarists. We are very pleased to be representing this fine maker as his exclusive US dealer.

Photos of this guitar taken just after completion

Valerio Licari was born in Rome, Italy, in 1981. As a teenager, his musical studies began with the classical guitar but he later learned to play other styles including acoustic fingerstyle, blues and ragtime, and eventually even started taking violin lessons. His academic work was entirely focused on music, including work in ethnomusicology, musical art and performance. He even enrolled in the International School of Violin Making "Antonio Stradivari" in Cremona and did an internship in bow making, ultimately receiving his diploma from this respected institution. In 2012, after working for six months as guitar wood production manager at Tonewood International in Cremona, he moved to Malaga, Spain, for a six-month apprenticeship with classical guitar maker Daniele Chiesa. It was at this time that he decided to settle in Spain - in order to more deeply study its traditional methods in classical and flamenco guitar making. He set up his workshop in Granada where he has remained until late 2019, when he decided to move back to his come country of Italy. He is now based in Turin where he also teaches at the musical instrument-making college called Accademia Liuteria Piamontese San Filippo.