This is our second guitar from Brian Itzkin who we feel is currently the number-one young/up-and-coming US luthier. Hands-down. And all we can say is that lightning has struck again. To us, this is everything anyone could want in a guitar. The power, the weight, the playability, the visuals, and most importantly the sound - although a "modern" guitar it captures the qualilties of the old Spanish guitars that were the instruments that have been so loved and cherished over the last 150 years by players, audiences and general music lovers. Brian's deep passion and love of the tradition - especially his hero Antonio de Torres - have been harnessed and focused into the build of this instrument. It is to us so refreshing to see how Brian's enthusiasm and understanding of the craft has been successfully captured here. It is astonishing, especially since he's not even 30 years old yet! The guitar has a dark, deep, old-world sound with rich harmonic content filling every note, yet not distorting or muddying the fundamental, partially also thanks to the low body resonance. The result is a clear, focused but rich and beautiful sound with a noticeably wide tonal palette of colors - the proverbial "symphony in a box". Simply put, this guitar really has everything any sensitive guitarist could want to fully express any musical idea in any of the guitar's repertoire.
The guitar is as beautiful in appearance as in sound. His materials are incredible, and we're discovered that Brian is quite the "lignophile" (yes that's a real word!) - for this guitar, he used three different "African rosewoods" - the fingerboard and head veneer are Dalbergia Trichocarpa, one of - if not the densest rosewoods from Madagascar. Bridge is Dalbergia Baronii, the most common Madagascan rosewood, and back and sides are Dalbergia Greveana which is a fairly plain looking Madagascan rosewood species but the weight, density, and tap tone are all nearly identical to Dalbergia Nigra from Brazil. Bindings are made of holly and the soundboard is highly marbled "bearclaw" Italian alpine spruce, an unbelievable set with copious amounts of "aguas" giving not just a lustrous "3D" appearance but also an indicator of being perfectly quartersawn - the must structurally, aesthetically and sonically desirable cut from the log - wow!
Structurally, Brian worked with the general ideas of Torres/Hauser, using a 7-fan system with bridge patch. The smaller scale of 635mm and 51mm make this comfortable in practically anyone's hands and there is absolutely nothing given up in either quantity or quality of sound - the guitar itself may be more compact but the tone is not - it remains as huge as his full-sized build. The 4-piece back and overall body proportions were inspired by several old guitars, Brian mentions two Torres, FE-05 from 1857 and FE-21A from 1864, as well as an 1870 Vicente Arias. The rosette pattern borrows the chain-link motif from a group of Torres from 1887-1888 (SE 111-116) for the central band and is flanked on either side by several layers of green/brown/blonde purflings and singular bands of half-herringbone patterned in 3 brown to 5 white ratios - subtle yet striking to the eye. Overall this is a beautifully made guitar and although new, sounds incredible straight out of the case and will only improve with continued playing. We are very happy to be working with this fine maker and look forward to many more!
Photos of this guitar taken during and after construction.
