#213 "The Lark"

 

The impetus behind this guitar is the work of Harry Fleishman, who I came in contact with while doing research on guitar makers in Boulder County in the 1970s and 1980s. Some photos of his work can be seen at http://www.fleishmaninstruments.com. Harry has made many instruments with tops made from two different wood species, normally Redwood or Cedar and Spruce. This is a different take on the term "double top".

This guitar's top is made from a wide grain Englemann spruce center panel with tight grained Western Red Cedar 'wings'. The back and sides are Khaya. The fretboard is Cocobolo Rosewood and the bridge is Vermillion (Padauk).  

My initial research led me led me to think that this was going to result in a strongly dampened sound, as Chladni patterns I'd witnessed in the raw top were not distinct and the modes of each wood appeared to cancel the other. This was not the case. After voicing the top it turned out to have reasonable sustain, although not as much as my concert series guitars. Below are a sampling of Cladni patterns and the bracing modifications required to achieve them. This is an interesting example of an impedance shift from one wood to the other. It should be noted that the normal set of modes did not appear on this guitar due to this impedance mismatch. However, as they say, "it still sounds like a guitar".

 The bracing as per the chladni photos                          Woods responding separately at 40Hz                                   And again at  204Hz

Woods responding together (mostly) at 256Hz

While it had an odd kind of tone on initial string-up, it has evened up nicely over time. This guitar has good volume and a deep tone on the bass side. There is good volume on the treble strings also and the balance appears to be good across the fretboard. It responds well to hard playing.

The owner of this guitar has dubbed this guitar "The Lark" because "the high notes just seem to have no top to them like a singing bird, to my ear that is like the notes of a meadowlark."