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I am proud to be able to say that I will be displaying at the Memphis Acoustic Guitar Festival. I have been working hard for 6 months getting 4 guitars ready for the show. I want to bring a variety of guitars with me so I can show a bit of diversity in my work and be able to cater to different peoples' taste. Hopefully I did that.

When my wife and I got word from Bob Singer that we were accepted into the show, we were ecstatic. We went out to the shop and starting digging through my wood shelf- putting together some unique tonal and visual combinations. There was one guitar that I had in mind that I didn't have a set for, but thanks to the OLF classifieds and John at Circa Guitars, I was able to get a crazy set of BRW to round out my 4 builds.

The first guitar I tackled was a cocobolo and western red cedar concert. I got this set of coco from Burton LeGeyt a while ago. I had been waiting for the right time to use it, and now seemed perfect. This guitar would be my "wood bling" guitar. I used radial cocobolo in the top purfling and the rosette to give it some visual interest and texture. For the binding I chose some high flame koa. I also chose to do an armrest on this one, which meant a koa armrest veneer. If you have ever done an armrest, you know that using ebony is the safest bet to get a seamless look. I was a bit nervous about getting this one perfect, but decided it was worth a try.

I used a matching set of cocobolo for the headstock overlays and the neck stripe. There is red all over this thing. There is also purfling all over the place.

Anyways, here are some pictures:

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

I love it! Very well done. Best of luck to you two in Memphis.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Very nice.....I like the look of the pinless bridge on that guitar...clean, simple and elegant. Good luck in Memphis.

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Blue Ring Acoustics
blueringacoustics.ca

Chris, I will be at the show as well. I'll have to stop by and say hello -- Beautiful guitars, I'm sure it will be a success.

I love everything about that guitar.

Tasteful! I love it. I'm looking forward to seeing the others. I wish I could sit down with it!

Beautiful work as always Chris. You will do well !

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The Shallower the depth of the stream , The Louder the Babble !
The Taking Of Offense Is the Life Course Of The Stupid One !
Wanna Leave a Better Planet for our Kids? How about Working on BETTER KIDS for our Planet !
Forgiveness is the ability to accept an apology that you will probably NEVER GET
The truth will set you free , But FIRST, it will probably Piss you Off !
Creativity is allowing yourself to make Mistakes, Art is knowing which ones to Keep !
The Saddest thing anyone can do , is push a Loyal Person to the point that they Dont Care Anymore
Never met a STRONG person who had an EASY past !
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Looking forward to the show, I will be bringing a few instruments, but the new builds are all delivered or will not be completed for the show. I am looking forward to seeing all the wonderful guitars that will be displayed.

Fred

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Fred Tellier
http://www.fetellierguitars.com
Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/FE-Tellier-Guitars/163451547003866

Stunning guitar Chris, good luck and enjoy the show.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Thanks for all the kind words everyone. Simon & Fred, I look forward to meeting you guys at the show.

Here is the second guitar that I will be bringing. It is my most "traditional" guitar. It is a brazilian rosewood and adirondack spruce ES. With this one, I wanted to appeal to the guitar buyer that likes the old standard. This is the set that I got off the OLF classifieds from John Slobod; the set itself is anything but standard. It just happens to be BRW. I had been drooling over this set for a while and finally pulled the trigger once we were accepted into the show. This set wasn't perfect and fought me a little bit during the process, but it all turned out fine.

With the classic tonewood combo of BRW and adi, I decided to use a classic aesthetic as well. I don't normally use much shell, but since this would be my "blingy-ist" guitar, I went all out on the top- using blue paua in the purfling and rosette. But since I had put so much glam in the top, and the back was screaming, I didn't want the rest of the guitar to be distracting. So i went with a very simple look on the neck- classic black ebony fingerboard and headstock overlays. Originally, I was going to use ebony for the bridge as well, but decided that a nice piece of BRW would be nicer and sound a bit better.

Here are some pictures:

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

My third guitar for the show is one that I had been wanting to build for a while. When I first discovered lutherie, ziricote was the first wood that I was really smitten with. I have been wanting to build with it for a long time now. I had come across a great large set of ziricote from RC Tonewoods a few years ago and have been sitting on it for a while. Now was the time to break it out.

With the set being so big, I knew that it needed to be my largest size- an auditorium. So this is a ziricote and carpathian spruce auditorium with a florentine cutaway. I used a simple, classy black ebony for my binding and armrest- knowing that I was going to put some flash in the purfling and rosette. I decided for these two elements to combine koa and turquoise recon stone to add a bit of color to an otherwise dark guitar. The segments of turquoise vary in size from largest to smallest as they go around the guitar's perimeter and around the rosette.

For the neck, I found inspiration in the work of David Wren. I have always loved his faux bound headstocks, and so I gave that a whirl. It was an interesting challenge, but I am happy with the result. I also drew inspiration from David in the cantilevered neck.

Enjoy some pics:

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

Very beautiful guitars Chris. Look forward to seeing you in Memphis.

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Beautiful and unusual tone woods at a reasonable price.
http://www.rctonewoods.com/RCT_Store
The Zootman
1109 Military Rd.
Kenmore, NY 14217
(716) 874-1498

The last guitar that I am bringing to Memphis is a quited sapele and german spruce ES. When I was in Canada learning to build in Sergei de Jonge's course, the woman next to me was building this exact combo. We became good friends over the duration of the course and I even got to help her a little bit on her guitar. When it was done and strung up for the first time, I was amazed by her little OM. It had amazing overtones and seemed to have a soul all its own. So when designing the builds for Memphis, I knew that I had to build with this combo. I had been wanting to for so long.

I got this set from Burton as well and the german spruce was an old set that came from Martin that I got from a fellow OLF member a while ago.

This is my simple build. The back and sides are just screaming on this one. So I didn't want to overcomplicate the design with other loud elements. The binding, bridge, fingerboard and some other small elements are all bois de rose. I wanted to give it just a splash of color rather than using ebony.

Enjoy the final pics of what I am bringing to Memphis and I look forward to meeting some of you there.

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

Beautiful--excellent craftsmanship!

Wow, three stunning guitars! I wish I was going to Memphis so I could test drive them. Good luck with the show!


Ken Jones
Mountain Song Guitars

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Mountain Song Guitars www.mountainsongguitars.com