Official Luthiers Forum!

or dormant, as it may be.

I got an email yesterday saying that 2025 was going to be the last year for print publication of American Lutherie, and that in 2026 they would transition to an all-online "Legacy" mode.
Which sounds to me like "no new content". Which is a shame, but print is rapidly fading away.

I was on the fence about re-upping this year anyways. I don't think I'll need any access past this year - I haven't used what they have online now. Guess I better look through there before I leave.

I guess this is in line with there being no more GAL conventions.

The GAL staff have done great work for decades and I think they've earned their retirement. It's too bad there doesn't appear to be a hand off to new staff to keep it going. I imagine that's not an easy thing to pull off though.

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Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Well - Tim & Bonnie Olsen weren't going to live forever. Isn't ASIA still going?

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Dang it, now how am I gonna know what day it is when I’m in the shop!

Kidding aside, a couple of seismic shifts of the last few years in the ecosystem.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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Insta - https://www.instagram.com/cbcguitars/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cbcguitars

I joined the GAL when I started building in 2006 and attended three conferences. I can safely say that most of what I know about lutherie I learned from the Guild (besides I liked the idea of a "guild" in the first place). I let my membership lapse a year or so ago when I pretty much stopped building.

I do have twenty years of American Lutherie and a couple of Red Book that I'll probably pass on to whoever I give my shop to when I finally do get around to shutting it all down,

I think they intend to create new issues of American Lutherie, but for them to be online only. They published an article I wrote this year, and I helped Tim edit a related one. I came away with a new appreciation for the amount of work Tim puts into it. The editing, creating the layout, fact-checking, making sense of and sometimes re-writing things, cross-referencing for accuracy, editing photos, meeting deadlines, etc. It is truly an enormous amount of work that he puts into each issue.

They did a fantastic job on the online edition. I hope it keeps going, but will miss the physical magazines.

The things I have learned from American Lutherie are incredible. It was the original way to share information, and the new ways are rife with people suffering the Dunning-Kruger effect. It's easier than ever to get into guitar making now, but I do not envy people who are new to it and the amount bad information they need to wade through.

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Instagram: @jfrenchluthier
Web: https://www.jfrenchguitars.com/

I am heartened to see postings from Jay, Josh, and Freeman that recognize just how much work goes into producing American Lutherie. Here's a bit of a peek under the hood on the subject of production (I am an American Lutherie contributing editor).

Articles are contributed by members, written by contributing editors, or are based on transcriptions from GAL Convention presentations. The editorial process is both labor intensive and time consuming. Editing is done for accuracy and clarity of course, but also for information density. And speaking of information density, there is an editorial limit on the amount of ad space in each journal . Also on the subject of ads, American Lutherie limits the size of ads to 1/4 page, this for editorial integrity purposes, so that no advertiser can dominate the ad space or the finances of the journal. The result of all this is a quarterly journal packed with useful and interesting information.

The AL staff is already beginning the task of putting most of the articles published in AL online. It is a time consuming process, and there are a lot of articles. Keep an eye on the website for new material.

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R.M. Mottola
LiutaioMottola.com

Author of the books Building the Steel String Acoustic Guitar and Mottola's Cyclopedic Dictionary of Lutherie Terms.

I was editor of a newsletter for an aquarium club back in the late 80's? for about a year. It was in another lifetime, and I was working 50 or more hours a week, so I don't remember for sure; but I think it was 4 issues a year; sent around to other clubs as well. It was only a dozen pages or less. Typewriters. People bringing things in at the last minute; that I would have to type out. Having to write things, and make cartoons or art work, for content.

I know that a magazine would be a lot or work.

But now I write all morning long, so I guess it was a prerequisite. Edits are SO much easier today than back then!

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Why be normal?