Nylon String Archtop

[stringman5]

Anyone out there that owns or has played one of these? There are a handful of luthiers making this kind of instrument such as Grimes, Thorell, Hahl, Benedetto and Slaman, to name a few. Interested to hear your thoughts or comments about these instruments.

[Richard Mott]

I've played one, maybe two. If I'm not mistaken, Linda Manzer may have built one of them. There doesn't seem to be any reason they can't be built, though I can see some inherent challenges. Nylon strings have considerably less tension than steel, and because archtops are driven by downward string pressure on the bridge rather than by strings anchored to and pulling up on the bridge, a nylon string archtop may require an extremely lightly-built top to get a response. According to luthier Ted Beringer, "The arch has to be thick enough to carry the downward pressure of the strings on the bridge, but thin enough to resonate properly. It's a delicate adjustment with steel strings, but with nylon strings the top has to be so thin that there is a much narrower difference between response and collapse." The great advantage of archtops, or one of them, is that they seem to have better string separation--fewer sympathetic cross-string vibrations, makes for clearer chords. Sympathetic vibrations seems to me less of an issue with nylon string guitars, especially at the treble end. Archtops also tend to spend their energy early, with more "push" and projection, and as a result usually with less sustain. Nylon string guitars seem to me often that way too. So there may be less reason to build them as archtops and correspondingly less player demand. Interestingly, the Music Emporium in Lexington MA recently had a Collings archtop nylon-string ukulele. It's just a beautiful instrument! It might be worth asking the staff there how it compared to their flattop ukes. Even more than classical guitars, ukes seem to have little issue with long sustain and sympathetic vibrations, so all my speculation above may be completely wrong. Collings probably built it for a reason and they make excellent ukuleles. The Fall 1999 issue of the magazine "Guitarmaker", published by the Association of Stringed Instrument Artisans, has an issue dedicated to nylon string guitars, and an article exclusively on archtop nylon stringed innovations. "Nylon String Archtops: A Collision of Traditions" features four luthiers writing about building them, including Markku Henneken, Alan Carruth, Stephen Marchione, and Ted Beringer. A few notable quotes: "This particular instrument is not a fine classical guitar. Although it has a wide dynamic range and very wide tonal palette, combined with good volume and terrific carrying power, its basic tone is thin. It works much better in a larger room than a small one, sounds much better to the audience than the player, and improves a great deal with a half hour's warm-up. ... it should make a very fine jazz instrument. ... It is possible that the 'Segovia sweetness' will never emanate from an archtop guitar." (The ever-candid Al Carruth.) "My customer reported that the nylon string archtop is preferable to his traditional Spanish guitar in several ways. It has superior playability ... the resonance and acoustic volume of my jazz archtops coupled with the different tonal palettes that nylon strings provide. And it projects a loud full voice that records beautifully." (Stephen Marchione.) Many thanks to Hans Andersson for the fascinating Guitarmaker article. --Richard

[Richard Mott]

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[Steve DeRosa]

Al Carruth posts on AGF on a semi-regular basis - you might consider dropping him a PM...

[stringman5]

Thanks for the replies, guys! Any other feedback?

[ResoN]

Here are a couple of videos of Neil Lamb playing his Benedetto archtop nylon string guitar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kjs1LAFuZk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kjs1LAFuZk

[stringman5]

Originally Posted by ResoN

Here are a couple of videos of Neil Lamb playing his Benedetto archtop nylon string guitar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kjs1LAFuZk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kjs1LAFuZk

Thanks, sounds kind of like what I would expect.

[RJVB]

Originally Posted by stringman5

Thanks, sounds kind of like what I would expect.

Old post, but that's twice the same video, and as so often we hear (almost) only the amplified output from whatever pickup is in the guitar. It does sound how you could expect a nylon-stringed archtop to sound, but there's just no telling how the actual instrument sounds unplugged (and IMHO you don't need a €€€€ hand-carved archtop to get this sound out of an amplifier).

I've tried nylon strings on an old archtop with a very thin laminate top. Lack of sustain wasn't really an issue, but the bracing and bridge were probably heavy enough to make the instrument sound anemic.

The Slaman Dome archtops seem to have a flat back; I wonder what the story behind that is. They also exist with a flattop-style bridge which transfers string energy to the top much like that would happen on a flattop.