How did you got started?

[Alexander López]

A few days ago someone asked how I got into Luthiery, so I'd like to know how others got caught in this business. Can we tell how it was for each one us, in just one paragraph? Here I go:

 

I had a childhood friend who became, just as I did, a teenager who wanted to play in a rock band. We didn't have money but some tools, so we started building an electric guitar from scratch using a batterred neck. He got some pointers from a friend who repaired his own instruments and I learned from him. Years later, after I finished college, I started to repair other friend's instruments and realized that luthiery satisfied my disparate likings: music, design, arquitecture, engineering, ergonomics, detailed craftsmanship, etc; so I became an avid learner and began to build a roster of clients who have been trusting their instruments to my home workshop.

 

What about you?

 

[Donald A. Fortune]

I played in a early 60's rock band back in the 60's and I adjusted players guitars-- kind of like doing a set up.

I was a high end cabinet maker for a lot of my working years and tryed my hand at making a guitar , and it worked out ,

and the rest is history, but I dont protest to know all there is because if you stop learning you might as well quit what you are doing..  Peace, Donald

[Justin]

I started as like a sales guy/counter help at the store I'm still working at now. That was about 7 or 8 years ago I guess. Then the repair shop needed some extra help like cleaning and stringing instruments. From there I slowly started doing basic repair work, after a couple years studying under the repair guy, the main technician retired. So I ended up taking over the shop, and now I pretty much work full time as a string instrument repairman. So long story short, I kinda fell into it and was offered an opportunity that I could not pass up. I feel very lucky. The store I work for is very well known in our local community and there are pretty much no other technicians around....So I have lots and lots of guitars and other string instruments to work on. Life is good as a tech around here. Hope to hear form other folks about there venture into guitar repair/building.

 

Thanks

Justin

 

[Mark Pollock]

In Sacramento, at least for a while, there were very few good repairmen and a lot of hacks with epoxy. After getting burned a couple of times (I never went to the right guys, I guess), I decided the heck with it, I'll do my own repairs. I completely gutted and rebuilt my 67 Super Reverb, reglued a terribly repaired headstock on a 65 Music Maker (which taught me not to do things half-assed, but just take the thing completely off and do it right), and things just kept going from there.

[Grahame Myers]

I've been an amateur player since I was 17, and have always fixed my own and other peoples guitars. I also worked as a guitar roadie for a number of years, before settling down and starting a family. Fast forward 25 years: Over 50, unemployable for the German employment market, (due to a long illness), what to do? I decided to try and make a life-long dream come true, and started a repair shop from scratch in 2008 (as I was already 54). I took any jobs I could get, including all the repair work for 2 music shops here.  After 3 years of hard work, my reputation is slowly spreading, and I get customers coming in from all over north Germany. I'm never gonna be rich, but I'm happy doing what I love, and I will never EVER go back to working for somebody else :-)

[Phil Keener]

I was a guitar/keyboard player in 1960's rock/R&B bands. Being mechanically and electronically inclined, I setup, repaired, and modified my own equipment. Soon, I was also setting up, repairing, and modifying everyone else's equipment. I kept Luthiery as a "hobby", building a few instruments every year until 2006 when I sold my engineering consulting business. Following my plans, I started Luthiery as a full-time venture in 2007. I schedule 1-3 repairs a day to pay the expenses and then concentrate on my instrument builds, or design & build jigs, fixtures and machine tools to sell or use in my shop. If I have any spare time, I use it to study Luthiery. There is so much to learn.

Best Regards to all,

Phil

[Michael P. Lemieux]

Hello,

I got interested in building and repairing about 15 years ago. I bought all the video's and books from Stewmac. Everytime I would go to the John in the morning I would bring in a book that had to do with guitar repair or building. I have what you call a toilet bowl education. I would fix guitars for free just to get the experience. I always told the person that it will not leave the shop in worst condition that it came in. I'm am self taught and am glad of that because I would look at the different ways the pros would do it then I would come up with my version. Just like playing music. Coming up with your own style. So that's my story, that's all I got to say. Sounds like lyrics to a song I've heard. Later friends,

Michael

[Matt Haugen]

In 1999 I was tinkering on ebay and I saw a 1930's Gretsch archtop BIN $100.00. I can't remember a thing about the description, but the heel was cracked, the action was high and the tuners needed to be replaced. I bought the guitar because it was a beauty, but quickly found out that I had no idea on how to repair it. I brought it into a luthier in Milwaukee and paid a small fortune to have it repaired. The work was done very well, but my quoted price and the price presented to me at the time of pick-up were very different. I actually ended up giving that guitar away because all I could think about was how much I had paid for repairs versus the guitar's value.... Anyways,  I saw another guitar a while later and thought I should try the work myself. I can't say things worked out perfectly back then, but the most important lesson I got from that experience was that I realized that I love giving life back to these old guitars that most people would cast aside as garbage. It is a really nice high to find an old piece of "junk" put it on the operating table and send it back out into the world with a rejuvinated purpose.

[Kerry Krishna]

I started off because I was buying cheap axes . They all needed repairs, and I couldn't afford to keep taking them back to the local Luthiers in my hometown of Winnipeg. So I started doing repairs myself . I had a tiny 30 sq foot room I was doing all my repairs in in a Collective owned house in 'Peg. When I moved to Montreal about 7 years latter, I found office space that I was quickly able to jery-rig into a workspace ( it was in University Of McGill's Entomology Museum! It's the second largest museum of it's kind in Canada!)  It was only about 80 sq feet. When I moved to Prince George Northern BC, it took a whole year to convince the local Book Store owner that I was a worthy tenant for an abandoned Luthiers shop that was in the basement. 1000 sq feet (!!!) and room to grow! I spent about a quarter of my wages over next three years doing renos, buying wood, and collecting tools. I now have spent maybe 24k on industrial tools, dust collection, and I have most of what I need to start production of the  E-mandolins that I have been blueprinting the last 25 years. God has been VERA good to me these last many years...