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The Guitar Repair Book

The Guitar Repair Book

Finally, after quite a long wait, my repair book has been published! The book took nearly two years to write, and covers a wide range of maintenance and repair work for acoustic (steel-string and classical) guitars. 270 pages with over 600 images covering everything from string changing through setup to replacing a soundboard. It will…

September 20, 2024 James Lister
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And now for something a little bit diffe...

And now for something a little bit different…

A slight departure from my usual, very traditional instruments. This was a commission, and the customer had a number of ideas that he wanted incorporated into his guitar. Amongst these were a 22 fret fingerboard, also with a zero fret. This called for a different approach to the soundhole, which is elliptical in shape, and…

January 8, 2023 James Lister
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Rosette making

Rosette making

Making a Traditional Classical Guitar Rosette   The traditional classical rosette consists of a number of components inlaid into the soundboard around the soundhole. The rosette in the image below has a central “end grain” pattern, a number of veneer lines, and two lines of half-herringbone (or rope). Some luthiers construct the whole rosette on…

October 15, 2019 James Lister
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Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Guitar Fe...

Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Guitar Festival 2019

I spent last weekend in Birmingham at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Guitar Festival hosted by Mark Ashford. The event combined concerts, masterclasses and workshops, and I took two guitars to exhibit, and a handful of students from Newark College, who had their own stand to exhibit their guitars and promote the guitar making course at…

February 5, 2019 James Lister
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2019 guitar festivals

2019 guitar festivals

Now that the new year has arrived, my thoughts turn to what exhibitions I will be attending this year. Actually, I’ve been thinking about this for several months now, and in particular, what my exhibition guitar will be this year. In recent years there has been an increasing amount of interest in shorter scale length…

January 3, 2019 James Lister
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Tonewoods

Tonewoods

Some stuff about tonewoods… What is a tonewood? A tonewood is any timber that has appropriate acoustic properties for musical instrument making. In terms of tonewoods, by far the most critical part of a guitar is the top (soundboard). There are a number of properties that a good tonewood should have. It should be stable…

November 29, 2017 James Lister
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Soundboard strutting systems

Soundboard strutting systems

What are struts (braces)?   The struts are lengths of wood glued to the inside of the top (soundboard), which act to support the top against the tension of the strings, and to control the overall sound that the guitar produces. They are usually made of the same material as the top, although often cedar…

November 1, 2017 James Lister
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West Dean Guitar Festival

West Dean Guitar Festival

Just returned from the West Dean Guitar Festival. Had an enjoyable time as always, much of it spent chatting to other luthiers! Highlights were mostly provided by the great Pavel Steidl, who gave a wonderful performance on the Saturday evening, and then tried one of my guitars at the exhibition (a spruce/rosewood guitar), and was…

August 23, 2017 James Lister
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Cordefactum Guitar Festival

Cordefactum Guitar Festival

Travelling to Belgium for the Cordefactum Guitar Festival this weekend. I will have 2 guitars with me – one spruce/Indian rosewood, and the other is an all non-tropical woods guitar (walnut/spruce), photo below. I’m also happy to say that Marcin Dylla will be playing the spruce/maple guitar he has on loan in the Saturday evening concert. James

April 12, 2017 James Lister
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Online article from Classical Guitar Mag...

Online article from Classical Guitar Magazine

The Classical Guitar Magazine article mentioned in a previous post is now available online. You can see it here: http://classicalguitarmagazine.com/fretwork-luthier-james-lister-blends-old-and-new-approaches/   Online version of my interview with Classical Guitar Magazine now available… https://t.co/EL5pruQTf5 — James Lister (@JListerGuitars) November 5, 2016  

November 5, 2016 James Lister
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Email: jmdlister@yahoo.com
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