Near the end of the 19th century, Antonio Torres designed a guitar that had a 650mm scale and a larger body size and wider neck than other guitars of his day. These elements along with refinements in the fan bracing, allowed for greater volume and bass response as well as for the development of a left hand technique for richer repertoire. For many players, the changes would be nothing but advantageous, but for players with small hands, the ability to make smooth transitions from note to note, that is to play legato would become compromised. One luthier I talked to said that the difference between the hand size and finger length of a man with large hands and that of a woman with smallish hands can be as much as 25%. The difference in scale length between a 650mm scale and a 630mm scale is about 3%. A person with hands my size playing a guitar with a 650mm scale is roughly comparable to a player with larger hands playing a 670 scaled instrument (longer than the Ramirez 660!) You can hit the notes but its pretty hard to do it smoothly. In addition the strain on the left hand makes playing an often tiresome and sometimes frustrating experience.

About a year ago I started to look for a smaller instrument. Guitars based on designs going back to Torres or before, even though they might produce a very beautiful sound, because of their characteristic design and bracing, did not have the volume I wanted. I had visited Kenny Hill in Santa Cruz who had a Torres guitar with a 630mm scale. It looked nice and was very comfortable to play but wasn't as loud as I wanted. Julian Bream, in the foreward to "Antonio Torres, Guitar Maker, His Life and Work" by Jose Romanillos, had said: "The guitar has won the hearts of its many admirers through its ability to evoke a musical ambience which is both magical and intensely personal. It is the character and quality of its musical voices that touches the heart strings". What I wanted was an instrument which would retain these qualities, be easier to play smoothly and keep as much of the volume of a standard size instrument as possible.

I contacted many luthiers, one of which, William Gilbert (son of John) said flat out that he would not recommend getting a guitar with a scale shorter than 650mm. Not only was he concerned that a short scale guitar would have limited power, he also thought I would become handicapped in my ability to play other guitars. Although he was well intentioned I guess the fact that I was already handicapped in my ability to play MY guitar hadn't occurred to him. Another luthier, Neil Ostberg advised on his website, "Get a good guitar that fits you and stop fighting the monster scales and thick necks." This was more in line with what I was thinking. Others had concern that with a shorter scale the bridge placement would be in incorrect proportion to the soundhole if the body size was unchanged. So why not change the body size? Though theoretically it made sense that a shorter scale and smaller sound box could mean reduced volume, I wondered if there were any short scale guitars made with a design and bracing that helped retain more sound.

I found some luthiers who had made 630mm scale guitars that they claimed had good tone and volume but many of them were not nearby so I couldn't try them. A luthier by the name of Milburn in Sweet Home, Oregon had made a 640mm scale but never a 630. He said it helped his hand after surgery. I had tried both sizes and knew that the extra 10mm made a difference.

I began to wonder if I would have to gamble on having a smaller instrument made by someone who "knew it could be done" but had never done it? Then one day I got an e-mail from Cyndy Burton who told me that her partner Jeff Elliott had made just such an instrument and that it had turned out very well. What he had done was to take the plans for a 1943 Hauser to Kinkos and shrink them so that the bridge placement would be in correct proportion to the soundhole. He currently had the guitar and invited me to come to Portland to try it. It was made with blackwood back and sides and a spruce top. When I played it I found that it had plenty of punch though I thought that I would probably prefer the warmer tones of rosewood to the blackwood for back and sides. His waiting list was twelve years and he charged $8,000 for his guitars. Too much for me, both money and time. He suggested that I talk to Woodley White who had apprenticed under him for many years and whom he felt confident could build the guitar I wanted. Woodley had built a 640mm scale that I tried and liked and Jeff was willing to share his plans for the 630 as well as his expertise to build a smaller guitar so I decided to commission Woodley.

Besides the use of high quality woods and the Hauser design with fan bracing, Woodley, as Jeff had done, used something called "open harmonic barring" which means that there are open spaces in the transverse barring to allow the sound to move better throughout the soundbox and get more of the top moving (see photo). He also made the soundhole slightly smaller than Jeff's guitar to allow for bringing out deeper tones in the rosewood. (See Woodley's notes below).

I like the sound of my guitar and it has plenty of volume. Because the bridge is closer to the soundhole, though not relatively so, I have had to adjust to the shorter range of tones from the warmer tones near the soundhole to the brassier ponticello near the bridge. But I rather like that short range now that I am getting used to it. It is a much more playable size for me and I think with time it will allow me to improve my playing if not only because it is so much more fun to play!

Woodley's Notes
(Woodley White's Website)

Body length: 474mm
Across upper bout: 275mm
Across lower bout: 356mm

"Body depth tapers from 100mm to 95mm (slightly deeper than the Hauser). The top is 2.7mm thick and tapers to 2.2mm around the perimeter of the lower bout.

The sound hole is 84mm (I went slightly smaller than Jeff here to lower the Helmholtz frequency and provide a richer bass with the Indian Rosewood.) We opened up the transverse barring as Jeff does on all his instruments, to compensate for the smaller body size and to get more of the top moving. The barring is 6mm by 6mm in the center then two bars adjacent to the center bar are 5.5mm by 5.5.mm then 5.0mm by 5.0mm and so on. The bars are made out of well-seasoned European Spruce. They are shaped like little houses (if you were to sight down the end after I glue and shape them, and they taper from a high point at the saddle to nothing at their ends.

All surfaces are sanded to 320 grit sandpaper or finer. The back and sides are 2.2mm thick. The sides and back are some Indian Rosewood that I purchased from Luthier's Mercantile around 10 years ago. The master grade top I purchased from Fortunat Ferrari in Switzerland at Tonewood AG - a wood supplier who has just gone out of business. The three guitars that I have built with this material all have superior tone.

The fingerboard was 50mm at the nut and 60mm at the 12th fret with 40mm string spacing at the nut. The fretboard tapers in thickness from 6mm at the nut to 4.5mm at the soundhole. This way I can build flat on the guitar's face without tweeking the neck forward and still get the proper distance off the sound board at the saddle - roughly 9-11mm. This is critical in achieving good tone. Any higher and the guitar will be louder but the tone will suck.

I did my best to duplicate the neck shape of your old guitar. We reinforced the Spanish Cedar neck with a 1/4 by 3/8 carbon graphite non-adjustable rod - for stability and tonal response.

The french polish is a recipe I got from Geza Burghart. It comes from a 19th century Hungarian book on violin and guitar finish. It has a very pleasant smell and is a bit harder than straight Luna shellac. The shellac and minerals are dissolved in grain alcohol that I buy at the liquor store - Everclear. That way it is completely non-toxic. The French polish takes at least a month to apply and consists of several hundred coats.

This plantilla (body shape) was created by a blue print service. They reduced the 1943 Hauser design from 65cm to 63cm. This means that the entire body was shrunk proportionally. By not shifting the bridge from the center of the lower bout and by reducing the entire shape in proportion to the reduction in scale length, we were able to create a similar sound to the '43 instrument.

It might be interesting to note for your guitar society that Jeff repaired an 1888Torres guitar a year or so ago that was owned and played by Tarrega. Some may have seen the famous picture of him with this guitar with a cigarette tucked in the tuning machine. The button on this machine was ruined by the heat of the cigarettes he smoked. It was remarkably similar in sound and construction to the 1943 Hauser. Clearly Herman Hauser I copied Torres."

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