The history of the Guitar BBC Documentary

[Philly Q]

good to see wayne hendersons workshop - all those of you who claim you cant build a guitar because you dont have the tools should take note of his favorite tool!!

Yeah yeah, OK  :oops: :roll: .  To be fair, be did also have a belt sander, a big gadget just for cutting soundholes and a vault of Brazilian rosewood.  Not exactly my kitchen.  He also had, it seemed, a vast amount of time on his hands - not surprising, given that he probably only has to sell one guitar a year to have a very comfortable lifestyle.

Very interesting programme though.  Neither a dry boring documentary nor the usual series of talking heads going "yeah Django was great".

[AndyR]

Hang on, reading Philly's post - have I mixed up Segovia and Django again?? I think I might have done... :oops:

EDIT: Fixed :D

[Philosoful]

That Rosewood 'wayne hendersons' looked amazing :D*adds to wish/gas list* I wonder how much an average guitar of his costs or if they're all one hundred squillion million dillion dollars.

I asked for pictures of my 8 string Conklin being made a while back (check the display pic!) + took a while to get a reply because Conklin had a film crew filming a documentary apparently which is going to be shown all over the world... COULD THIS BE IT?!?! Electric guitar = next Sunday so :DI just emailed him asking if this is it, I'll let you guys know once he replies, I hope he shows my guitar :lol:

[gwEm]

I enjoyed it - definately looking forward to next weeks.. i imagine its all stuff the real guitar geeks amongst us already know but its still nice to see it in a documentray thats done so well

maybe we'll know more about the modern instruments to come, but i for one didn't have too much idea about the ancient pre-guitar instruments, or even the 'baroque guitar'. of course django reinhart and the history of martin etc etc was something i knew about, but it was presented in a new way. bert weedon came across really well - still so passionate about the instrument and his playing, never seen an interview with him.

with the guy in the big medieval hat, it seemed more to me like his girlfriend was just shown in a token way, just to make him seem less crazy ;) as you say wez, he definately knew what he was doing with those ancient instruments though.

[WezV]

There are two more parts to come so i imagine next weeks will be early electric guitar development hopefully focusing on the addition of pickups and amps... maybe also the other early attempts at making the damn things louder like resonators.

I would imagine conklin would be in part 3 if he was in it... assuming thats going to be modern guitars and new developments like fanned frets and extended range instruments


Philly - the big tools wayne has may help him do things quicker, but all the jobs can all be done with simpler tools and extra patience!  apparently he does about 20 a year.. not a bad income at that rate of production!  I still need to buy his book

[gwEm]

did they say they sold one of waynes guitars recently for $300k?

i wonder if steinberger will be mentioned at all. also expecting the next edition will start with resonator guitars.

[Ratrod]

It was nice to watch.

What really surprised me is that the guitar still has the same function it had centuries ago. A troubadour's instrument. Someone telling a story, accompanied by guitar, capturing (seducing) the audience. Even the strumming and picking technique has remained the same.

[Philly Q]

Philly - the big tools wayne has may help him do things quicker, but all the jobs can all be done with simpler tools and extra patience! 

OK, OK, maybe when I retire!

[Afghan Dave]

Philly - the big tools wayne has may help him do things quicker, but all the jobs can all be done with simpler tools and extra patience! 

OK, OK, maybe when I retire!

So not long now then... eh Philly?  :lol: :lol: (sorry - cheap shot)

[Philly Q]

So not long now then... eh Philly?  :lol: :lol: (sorry - cheap shot)

Should have seen that coming...  :lol:

Although I'm not quite sure what the retirement age is now (or will be), I think in fact I'm only halfway through my working life... there's a depressing thought.  :(

[dave_mc]

i missed the first 10 minutes... wasn't that fussed on the first half that i saw (seemed to only be worried about using the guitar for serenading, not to mention, why is there always someone in documentaries in silly period clothing? o_O ), but then when it got to the acoustics, it picked up a lot. i guess a complaint would be that, like most modern documentaries, it goes for gimmicks rather than actual good solid info, but it's still far better than no guitar documentary. looking forward to the electrics next week, obviously... :)

[Philly Q]

... wasn't that fussed on the first half that i saw (seemed to only be worried about using the guitar for serenading, not to mention, why is there always someone in documentaries in silly period clothing? o_O ), but then when it got to the acoustics, it picked up a lot. i guess a complaint would be that, like most modern documentaries, it goes for gimmicks rather than actual good solid info

I liked the gimmicks, especially the little historical re-enactments, they were very entertaining.  I think Alan Yentob, as a non guitar player, brought a very different approach to a documentary about guitars.

Much better than Slash sitting in a semi-darkened room wearing sunglasses and mumbling some cr@p he's said a thousand times before.

[Johnny Mac]

Eric Clapton even had to wait 10 years for a Wayne Henderson guitar. Well that made me chuckle! 

I enjoyed it. I liked the bit about the barbers and playing an early version of the guitar while waiting for a haircut!

Looking forard to next weeks, about electrics!

[38thBeatle]

I missed it- bah.

[Johnny Mac]

I missed it- bah.

bbc iplayer mr 38th, you could watch it now!  :D