My Dad's old La Michoacana classical

[big jilm]

Hi, everyone.

I'm quite ignorant when it comes to nylon string guitars. I was wondering if any of the experts here can tell me anything about my father's guitar. It's a La Michoacana from possibly the late 60's.







It has a very mellow and beautiful sound - it sounds much better to me than any classical I have tried. I looked up La Michoacana on the internet, but the info I got wasn't very specific. Is this cedar, do you think?

I am about to attempt a restringing as well. Right now it has ancient strings with steel wound strings mixed with nylon. What strings would you suggest? Aren't there sets that have all 6 strings made of nylon? Is there an advantage to this?

Anyway, thanks very much for any info!

[Clydeslide]

The three bass strings are always wound, never plain nylon. The bass strings should also just have a single loop at the bridge to secure them rather than the triple loop. If you stick it in Google I'm sure you'll find a picture, I can do it from my phone.

Can't help with the guitars origins and specs I'm afraid.

[scottishrogue]

Big Jilm, I copied this from another forum, which you might find valuable.

"What do you mean "Mexico isn't renowned for excellent guitars"? I beg to differ. You're just like the cowboy with the smelly brown mustache, you've been looking for love in all the wrong places. BUT, if you can get to Paracho, Michoacan, you will be amazed at what you see. EVERYBODY in the whole **** town makes guitars. There are hundreds of guitars everywhere. Aside from the high end custom shops, guitars for sale are hanging on the walls at the Pemex, the bakery, garages, the jail... If you can't make it to Paracho (pity because it's beautiful country- forested mountains near Lake Patzcuaro) but have occasion to visit Mexico City, the premier custom guitar shop is "La Michoacana". The owner/master guitar maker (if he's still alive) is from, yep, Paracho. Andres Segovia and the Romeros have owned guitars from La Michoacana."

I have several Spanish style guitars, one from Cadiz, Spain...with a rosette quite similar to the rosette on the guitar you have. And I recently acquired another Spanish style guitar sold by another guitar shop in Mexico City, called Repertorio Wagner. It seems that most everyone and their brother is making handcrafted guitars and providing stock for their favorite retail establishment. Some are high quality, some...not so much. It seems you have one of the better guitars from Mexico, just as I have.

Glen

[big jilm]

Thanks for the info! I have not played very many nylon stringers, but this old guitar is the best sounding classical I have ever played. It also smells really good, for some reason.

Can anybody tell what the top is made from? It has a very mellow tone, just beautiful.

[redir]

Do you have any pics of the back and sides? It's not easy to tell you what the top is made out of but it's probably some form of spruce as it looks like there is some cross grain silking.

[Pedro Navaja]

The guitar is from Mexico City, not Paracho. It was made by GERONIMO VILLAPAN AMEZCUA. Some spell his last name with an "f" instead of a "p." He is the registered owner of the trademark. It is considered a good guitar. If you like the way it sounds, then keep it. For restringing it, I would recommend Savarez 500CJ Corum Cristal Classical Guitar Strings, High Tension, Blue Card.

There are some world class guitars coming out of Paracho, very well-known outside of the Anglophone world. There is a Paracho luthier in Los Angeles who has become quietly famous. His name is Vazquez Rubio. You can find him on the web.

[harpon]

Yeah, looks like a nice guitar-

as for the strings, personally I would probably start with some D'addario Pro Arte Normal, or even light tension, and see how it goes
especially if you've never played classical-
and the reason being more purely practical than the feel or the sound of the strings-

most classical guitars, older ones especially, don't have truss rods to adjust the height of the string action,
and the necks bow over time from the string tension-

so most guitars then actually have a "length of days" as to how long the neck bow gets too pronounced and the action too high to be adjusted back within normal range-

and when the action gets high, the strings feel as if they have more tension at the same pitch anyway

I've been through this with several guitars- as the action starts getting higher- and the strings are higher in the middle of the scale length because the neck is bowing over time under tension-

the first solution is to keep filing /grinding down the height of the bridge piece- whjen that gets down to the height of the wood, you have to file THAT down and maybe make the channel deeper-
the only other alternative to getting a whole new neck installed is to remove frets and shave the fingerboard down by the nut-

anyway the point being-
the higher the string tension- the sooner the neck will bow, and the shorter the overall life of the guitar will be-

so I personally try to play the lightest tension that feels and sounds good to me- the guitar will last longer
a more novice player will find lesser tension strings more comfortable to play longer, and the sound difference is really very slight between differing tension levels

and so these are some things to consider buying used guitars-

if you're lucky, the guitar may have not seen much use and the strings stretched to lower tension, or it was kept untuned, so that the neck hasn't bowed as much through the years.

Looking at the fingerboard in the pictures- there appears to be little or no fret wear- so it looks at least as if the guitar has not really even been played very much-
We can't see the string height of the action over the soundhole end of the fretboard from the pictures here-

you could measure that from the side- the height of the fretboard to the top of the strings perhaps- or a photo- and we could assess better the playability

looks like a real find, and I'm sure sounds excellent, even if it's not worth thousands- a lot of people would be green with envy.

[bparada]

I realize that this post is from quite a few years ago, but I just saw it. I grew up playing La Michoacana guitars. My brother had one of their flamencos and I had two standard classicals. They were fabulous instruments! I started playing when I was 6 and my parents took me to meet Villafon in person in Mexico City when I was 11. I got to play for him and visit the shop. He was such a nice man and such a wonderful luthier.

We used Augustine Black and Reds (mostly Black) on these guitars. Of the three, we kept the flamenco, which I just gave back to my brother. It's held up super well over the years. (I think that they were all spruce tops and Indian rosewood sides and backs.)