Yesterday, I was looking at Sam (the guitar) and noticed something I hadn’t before. The particular angle of sun in the room helped. I saw that Sam’s surface is covered with tiny fracture lines.
They’re not in the wood; they’re cracks in the finish–what are often called surface cracks. Nor are they surprising; guitars get old the same way people do (or perhaps people get old the same way that guitars do) and Sam is more than 50 years old. Various finishes, in Sam’s case nitrocellulose, react to temperature and humidity changes differently than the wood they’re protecting. So they crack. This sort of thing happens over the course of fifty years.
It’s hard to think about that amount of time. Fifty years–a lifetime for many people. A lifetime ago for me.
When I graduated from high school, a couple of years after the Sam was made in the C.F. Martin factory, this country was celebrating its bicentennial. We’re now two years shy of our semiquincentennial.
Though we were just getting out of a war, though a President had resigned in disgrace, I have this vague memory (I was young!) of the years just before the bicentennial being hopeful years. I’m not certain I feel that way now. In fact, I’m certain that I don’t feel that way now.
Hopefully, we will survive the next couple of years and, in the long run, perhaps, all of this will just look like surface cracks.
This is another one of those posts where I tell you what I have been wrong about for all these years. This time, it’s about guitars.
I presently own four guitars, and one guitar-shaped object (I’m really being unfair to the last one, and the reason may become apparent below).
So,
WHY DO YOU OWN SO MANY FRICKIN GUITARS‽‽‽‽‽‽‽‽
…I hear you shout/question. That last symbol is an interrobang.
Well.
I used to believe that everyone in the world needed no more than three guitars. One classical or otherwise nylon-strung; one electric; and one steel-string.
When I left for grad school, I shed the Ovation and the Ibanez, and the little Martin (which should be well-known to you by now as “Sam,”) became my one and only. Other guitars came and went, but Sam has always been my go-to instrument.
Over the past few years, he’s been joined by what I think will be my stable set of instruments until they’re pried from my cold, dead hands. Rosie, my Frankenstein’s monster electric. Tom (I think that’s his name) my semi-classical Takamine. And finally, most recently, Gil, the Guild F30.
My guitar-shaped object is a genuine made-in-Spain classical, given to me by a friend, that–alas–spent much of its life in a damp basement and, because of that, has suffered neck damage that really needs an expen$ive repair. Some day, maybe. Then it will have a name, too, I hope.
Anyway. Today’s post is about depth. And tone.
So why do I need two steel-string guitars, anyway?
Well, there are some differences in construction. Gil is a bit bigger than Sam. His scale length is longer (by 1/2″ or so). He’s built much more heavily (though I haven’t measure, I would guesstimate that Gil’s top is probably almost twice as thick as Sam’s). There’s different bracing inside. They’re also slightly different in age, Sam being built in Nazareth, PA, in about 1972-3, and Gil in Westerly, RI in 1979.
Both are built out of solid woods (mahogany and spruce). They even have the same sort of trim around the body and soundhole and the same kind of position markings. That they both have “tortoiseshell” pick guards is kind of a nice accident of history (I replaced Sam’s black one a few years ago; Gil’s is original).
The big difference is their depth. Take a look:
On the left is Sam. On the right is Gil. Photos taken from about the same distance from the camera.
What I want you to notice is that Gil’s sound box–his body–is significantly deeper front to back than Sam’s. And, honestly, I think that makes all the difference.
For years, I’ve noticed that classical guitars, which are about the same size as Sam, but which have deeper bodies, are more resonant at lower frequencies (There is a lot of hoo-hah out there about various guitar sizes. I was hoping to find a link that compared classical guitars with Martin 00s, but it doesn’t exist, so you’ll have to take my word for it). They ring, while Sam’s tone at the low end is more of a thump. It’s there, but it doesn’t ring. Which is fine. Gil’s bass notes ring. Sam is more balanced across all notes; Gil is best on the highs and the lows, and less good at the balanced middle.
I love Sam, and I love Gil. They’re both acoustic guitars, but they’re as different from one another as an electric and a classical. Same notes, different tone.
Anyway, so there’s your answer about why I have so many guitars. Because, in the long run,
I was sitting in my office scrolling through Facebook this morning and saw that one of my favorite professors from law school has just closed out his teaching career after more than 30 years at the law school. I had more classes with him than with anyone else, because he was a great teacher.
I wish I could be as good an instructor, but I’m never likely to be. But that note–about him teaching his final class–got me to thinking a little. You see, I’m sitting here in my office waiting to give a final exam (not really–the class had a final paper, but we’re required to meet during the exam period, so I’m showing What the Constitution Means to Me instead of giving an exam.
But I’m remembering my very first final exam. The year was 1976, the class was Modern European History I (the first of three classes) and I was sitting in a lounge on the first floor of Anderson Hall at the University of Minnesota going over my notes, and realizing that I could never cram all of the dates and events into my head. The lounge was vintage 1970s–carpeted floors, furniture with wooden frames with dark blue and red cushions, and the Mississippi river out the window and down the hill. I was using a fountain pen loaded with ‘turquoise ‘Peacock’ ink (Sheaffer–good stuff) on, IIRC, a notebook filled with yellow paper. I was between girlfriends and furiously balancing courses in history, Hebrew, philosophy and Shakespeare (only four courses, because Minnesota was a quarter, or “trimester” school).
I was 18 and I was going to live forever.
Suddenly it’s 48 years later. I’m 66 and I’ve been (post college) a research assistant, a grad student, a sociologist, a teacher, a software engineer, a law student, a lawyer, and here I am a teacher again.
I just went to get some coffee from the student lounge here–a more sterile place, I suppose, with tile floors and wooden chairs (I’ve seen worse, though). The cashier there bet me that exams “back then” were a lot harder than exams today, but I don’t know.
If you’re a historian (say) there’s about 50 more years of history. Computers have gone from the punch-card-reading remote monstrosities of legend to the things we carry in our pockets. Wars and rumors of wars; the disassembly of the Soviet Union and the possible disassembly of the United States. Back then, most of what we bought was made in the United States; today most of what we bought is made elsewhere, largely in what we called (then) Red China.
Yes, more information is available (I recently saw a photo of a card catalog with the legend “my first search engine) but more bullshit as well. There’s no Walter Cronkite anymore. Or Hubert Humphrey.
In my first election, I voted for Jimmy Carter because I thought he was a decent man. I still do–having briefly met him. But he served one term, and then left office with grace. I have lived to see a person I consider not to be a decent man leave office kicking and screaming, and he may be back. But I’ve also lived to see the first Black president and the first female VP. There were no women on the Supreme Court in 1976, and today there are four.
We’re finally going back to the Moon, and maybe human beings will step on Mars within my lifetime.
I’ve seen all nine (9) Star Wars films (more about that, perhaps, another time).
Under absolutely optimal conditions, I have significantly less time left than I’ve spent on this planet.
This morning I stopped in at my favorite bookstore/coffee shop and then took off to go elsewhere.
Going elsewhere meant waiting for a green light so that I could cross the rather busy street (Whitney) that lay between here and there, and onto Putnam.
I got the light and started up, only to trackstand for a moment as a pedestrian started across the crosswalk on the other side of Whitney. Against the light, if I may say so.
This person waved me through ahead of him (after I had stopped on the bike to wait for him) saying “I don’t want to slow you down–you’re a sitting duck out there!”
Now, it’s possible (just) that he was being sarcastic, but I think he meant it. He figured that, being on a bike and obeying traffic laws, I was more at risk than he was.
What I should have said was something like this:
Sir:
I am not a sitting duck. As you can plainly see, I obey traffic laws. Those laws generally serve to protect me. I stop for stop signs and red lights.
I am wearing a helmet. Not great protection, but back around 2004 one saved my skull, so I wear it.
As you can see, my bike has lights front and rear. I dissent from the theory proposed in Zodiac: The Eco-Thriller by Neal Stephenson:
“I had to ride slow because I was taking my guerrilla route, the one I follow when I assume that everyone in a car is out to get me. My nighttime attitude is, anyone can run you down and get away with it. Why give some drunk the chance to plaster me against a car? That’s why I don’t even own a bike light, or one of those godawful reflective suits. Because if you’ve put yourself in a position where someone has to see you in order for you to be safe–to see you, and to give a fuck–you’ve already blown it… We had a nice ride through the darkness. On those bikes we were weak and vulnerable, but invisible, elusive, aware of everything within a two-block radius.”
I am, in short, aware of my surroundings, and of the threats, and of how to protect myself against them.
It’s hard for me to articulate whats I think should happen in the Middle East. Mostly it’s hard because it sounds like I’m just a mealy-mouthed compromise artist.
But sometimes you need to be a mealy-mouthed compromise.
The prosecution of the Jews in Europe during WWII should not have happened.
The displacement of the Palestinians after WWII should not have happened.
But absent at the very least a time machine, here we are, lifetimes later, and there is a large and growing deprived population in Gaza and the West Bank, and there is a nation-state called Israel with a large and growing population.
Neither population will vanish in a flash. Nor should children be made responsible for the sins of their parents.
Israel must compromise and adopt a two-state solution; Palestinians (through Hamas or some other entity) must accept the existence of Israel in some form as part of that two-state solution. Until that happens, people will die on both sides for stupid goals. Not ideals or even principles–stupid positions.
It sucks to have half a loaf. It sucks even more for both sides to fight over who gets the whole loaf when they are killing children. Because children are not just dying; both Israel and Hamas are actively killing children.
There is no “good guy” here. There is only evil.
So protest against Israel’s actions. Protest against Hamas’s actions. Protest for peace. If that means calling for return of the hostages, so be it. If that means calling for your university to divest from businesses that do business in Israel, do it. Use every lever available to tell both sides to fuck off and make peace.
I’ve talked about The Guitar’s Friend before. When I was young, it was my guide, my guru, my way of understanding guitars as musical instruments and as things. I learned about strings, I learned about woods. This was how we learned things in those days–this and, before long, the bunch of friends I made who knew music.
Here’s a page from the book:
There was always something about the shape of the F-30 that got me. It wasn’t to be. My first good guitar was an Ovation Country Artist (made in Connecticut). It was followed by a low-end Gibson electric, and that was ultimately followed by a Martin OO-18 (sometimes 00-18, depending).
The 00-18, named Samuel (Sam for short), became my musical friend for life. At this point, Sam and I have known each other for (roughly) 45 years. You can read about him here, here, and here. And a few other places as well.
The reason I never owned the F-30 wasn’t that it was super expensive or anything; it’s that nobody in my area carried Guild guitars (as far as I knew) and this was before the Internet, O Best Beloved, and things got handled through the yellow pages and word of mouth. And even had the Internet existed back then, what kind of bloody fool buys a musical instrument without first laying their hands on it, stroking it, and listening to it speak?
Nope.
Now I’ve got lots of good guitars. Sam; an (still as yet) unnamed Takamine hybrid nylon-string; and Rose, my frankensteined electric. I’ve touched some of the guitars I wanted as a young person–I have held in my hands and played an Alembic. I owned (for a few years) a Giannini Craviola. It’s been my privilege to play Martin D12-35s, harp guitars, all kinds of things. But those childhood romances sometimes stick in your head.
Last weekend, T was going to a conference in Providence, Rhode Island. You know, that town that forms one end of the Eagles song about Paradise? Nice place, actually. Anyway, we were working on a paper for another conference, and figured that if I went along, I could get some peace and quiet while T conferred and get good work done on the paper at the same time. That’s what happened, but by Saturday afternoon I was burnt and the conference was over, so we packed up and headed back toward Connecticut.
Now, thanks to Child Process 3 (and their spouse) we have developed a habit of antiquing. And so, on the way home, we stopped in at a couple of places. One of them turned out to be in the town of Westerly, RI.
Guild guitars, from the time I was in second grade (or so) through the ’90s (at least) were made in Westerly, Rhode Island. It was the factory’s third home, after Manhattan and Hoboken. So I kind of figured that during the antiquing, I might find some memento of the Guild factory–a badge, a catalog, something like that.
That turned out not to be the case, but a couple doors down from the antique place was a door with a sign hanging above it that said “Frets.”
Figuring this would be a fun place to spend a few minutes out of the rain (it was very gray that day), we popped into Frets. At first I thought it would be full of inexpensive plywood guitars (not judging–much) and electrics, but that proved not to be the case.
While the shop window was filled with broken guitars, necks, bodies (oh the humanity!!) and the first ten feet or so of the shop did have some lower-end instruments, once you got to the main room, two things hit you in the face. First, cigar smoke (the shop is next to a cigar lounge). And second, a number of beautiful guitars, most costing significant amounts of money. There was a 1960s Ovation thin-line electric. There were Guild electrics and acoustics. There was a 1970s-era Craviola. There was a Martin D12-35 with a $5,000 price tag. Gibsons, Gretschs, you name it. And sitting there on consignment?
A 1979 Guild F-30.
I picked it up.
Inside was the label–that guitar had been made in Westerly.
I played it. It was darker than Sam. It had bass. Likely because its body was a full inch (or more) deeper than Martin OO guitars. So it wasn’t that much bigger, but it had a depth to the tone that I’d never heard before.
I put it down.
It was a lovely instrument, but Sam was sitting at home; I already had a nice guitar, and I hadn’t yet got all the notes out of it.
After a few minutes I inhaled deeply, coughed (damn cigars!) and we headed home.
But what sat in my mind was that the next weekend–this weekend–we would be heading to the next conference to present our paper. And that conference was in Newport, RI, and Westerly was on the way. I asked T if she thought it would be crazy of me to buy that guitar. She didn’t think I was crazy.
But I put it out of my mind. Or tried to. And when I got home, I played Sam and was convinced I would never see that F-30 again.
T knew better.
So I made a deal with myself. I would take Sam on the trip to Newport. I would play the guitars side-by-side so I could compare their tones. And then I would either walk out of Frets a free man, or I would have two guitars with me.
The day came, and we pulled into Westerly and went to Frets. The F-30 was still there, sitting between a pair of Martins. I put down Sam’s case and pulled him out. I ran through a few things. Then I got the F-30 and did the same.
There was no comparison. Both guitars sound excellent, but they sound different. I looked over the Guild, noticed a couple of issues, and spent the next hour or so talking to the store owner, Zak. Yes, the saddle is very low; yes, it’s going to need a neck reset at some point in the next ten years or so that will probably cost 50% of what the guitar was priced at (and because the F-30 is a vintage guitar, that is a very non-trivial amount). No, the machines and pins aren’t original. It’s been damaged and repaired.
Didn’t matter. I bought it. And now I’m going to squeeze every last note I can get out of it. Meet Gilbert.
A few months ago, I took my little Martin OO-18 (about which I’ve said much here) to a guitar shop to get an estimate on some work. Specifically, I’ve worn down the frets a bit, and I thought it might be time to get those taken care of.
The repair person took a look and indicated that they’d be a little shy about working on a “vintage” Martin.
So yeah, it’s 51 years old this year (according to its serial number) and I’ve owned it for about 45 of those years (it languished for a while in a music store in St. Paul). So it’s over 50 years old and I guess that makes it vintage. Huh.
Well, I turned 66 years old this past March 23 (I forgot–things got kind of crazy) and so I guess I must be vintage, too.
And now a word about the road whose logo I’m borrowing:
Route 66 ran from Chicago to Los Angeles, and I rode it in a gold 1965 Plymouth Fury III with my parents and my brother back in the day (by which I mean 1968). We headed from St. Paul to San Diego, and Route 66 was the way to go. We could see the construction of the interstate highway system going on around us, but couldn’t imagine that anyone would need anything grander than 66. It was called “the mother road,” and gas stations were named for it. Ray Bradbury wrote stories about how ’66 was being bypassed by the interstate.
Route 66 officially ended around 1985. Today, bits and pieces remain. Like me (made up of bits and pieces). But like Route 66, I’m still here. So don’t forget to…
Well, I guess it has. I hadn’t written anything here since January, and here it is March.
Sigh.
Life has been extraordinarily busy the last little while. T and I are working on a book; I have several cases cooking along (slowly, but they require attention); and I’m teaching two college-level classes.
Plus, there is the occasional day when the rain and/or cold and/or wind stops, and I absolutely have to get on my bicycle and ride.
And have I mentioned the music? Friday afternoons have become the time to make music; a bunch of us with guitars and voices get together and just shoot out tunes. Some of them are good, some of them we remember all the words to, and some are just weird. Example:
That’s a song I hadn’t heard since I listened to the Doctor Demento radio show back in the 1970s…all of a sudden one of the group started up on it and, well.
OK. So the family situation remains much the same. Seven of us living in a house that would really be OK with three, perfect with two.
The cats are doing well, at least.
T and I are rewatching The Good Fight, which I can heartily recommend. You at least have to love the opening credits.
Oh, and if you really want to read something satisfying? There’s always the 11th Circuit. Check it out.
Fujifilm X20, 28.4mm, f/4 at 1/800. Emulation: Fujifilm Velvia, ISO 100.
The other day, my daughter and I were having a discussion about the relationship between photography and art, occasioned by an essay in Janet Malcolm’s Diana and Nikon, one of my favorite books on photography.
Malcolm writes about the early, “photorealist” days of photography, in which photographers posed their subjects, much as painters had done, in an effort to create “art.”
I have always thought that so-called “street photography” was superior, capturing the Cartier-Bresson “decisive moment.”
But when I look at this photograph, I do not know which it is. Is it a quick snapshot of the time and place, or an attempt to look like an old master’s portrait of a rose?
I took it just over a week ago on the grounds of the Alhambra in Granada, Spain. I took it because it was the only rose blooming in the Red City as far as I could see (there may have been many more in the gardens of Generalife, but, if so, I didn’t notice those). It was afternoon, and the light was just starting to dim a little (sunset comes late to Granada, even in January).
This image is straight out of the camera. It just happened this way. So is this reportorial street photography, or “art”?
(NB: I’m in Spain right now, but when I return home, I hope to post a photo of Pat from 1981)
When I was an undergraduate at the University of Minnesota, I changed majors fairly frequently, until I found myself in the Department of Sociology. I took an introductory course and it just wowed me.
Now, I realize that an undergrad degree in sociology is essentially what I like to call a “Ya want fries with that?” degree. That is, it doesn’t get you anywhere.
I was fortunate in that I found myself then destined for a career in sociology, and one of the reasons for that was Pat Lauderdale. It’s important to note that I never had a course with Pat, but through a series of discussions formal and (mostly) informal, he became one of three advisers on my honors thesis. What had started out as a paper on deviance–specifically, the social psychology of male homosexuals–became a 100 pp. (+/-) discussion of the way a group could become politicized and reject the label of deviance.
Pat taught criminology and deviance, but with a political understanding that much of crime and deviance was a consequence of who got to make the laws and describe what was “normal.” He an another adviser of mine, Jim Inverarity, wrote a book, Law and Society, on the topic, and that book is still important. Pat and Jim and my third advisor, the late Harold Finestone, wrote recommendations for me to a whole bunch of schools, and I ended up attending the University of Chicago thanks to them. We spent a lot of time together, and I remember watching Altered States with Pat and several other grad and undergrad students and discussing sociology as an analog to the kind of human experiments in that film.
I was last in communication with Pat, very briefly, a year or so ago; I learned just this morning that he had passed away in November.
Inter Alia (AKA Law School is So Over) 
