This is a Torres La Leona (The Lioness) reproduction. Torres built La Leona in Sevilla in 1856. It gained a reputation for possesing the voice of a Lion. Torres never sold this guitar, although he lent it out to some of the most accomplished players of the day. Torres himself called this guitar “La Fea” meaning the ugly one, because it’s said, he never applied a finish to it. Ive made a number of these La Leona reproductions with excellent results. This guitar features mediterranean Cypress Back and sides with a 3-piece back (same as the original) with spruce soundboard, French polished throughout, scale is 650 mm. The original featured a Tornavoz, a metal cylinder inside the guitar under the sound-hole. While I’ve made both, this one I decided to go without the tornavoz. Another unusual feature of La Leona is the Bridge. The original is a lute like style where there was no saddle, and the strings were tied on in the lute-like style. Ive made both styles, and i think the modern player would appreciate having a saddle to adjust the action if need be. I really love the sound of this particular La Leona. PRICE $6500 Available September 23rd 2023.
Cedar/Cocobolo Guitar Available.
I was very happy when I strung her up this mourning, very responsive, full rich tone with a dynamic reserve of power. Cedar soundboard with Cocobolo back and sides. Scale is 650 mm. French polished throughout. Fitted with Rubner snakewood tuners PRICE $7500. Available August 27th 2023. SOLD September 12th 2023.
Cedar Cocobolo Guitar Available Now
Features a cedar soundboard, and three piece sides, in maple and cocobolo, back with matching maple fillet. Multi-layered green purfling. The rosette is a copy of the Torres SE 114 Tarrega played until the end of his life. Ebony carved head with Excalbar sword ornament. Adjustable/sliding saddle. French polished, scale is 650 mm, futzed with Gotoh Premium tuners. Price: $8400 Available 6/21/2023. SOLD September 15th 2023.
Torres 1862 Replica Available Now
I was fortunate to have the original Torres 1862 in my shop for several days to study and take measurements. Ive made replicas of this guitar for the owner of the original Torres, as well as the American virtuoso Matt Palmer. I’ll post a link below.
This guitar features both Birdseye and flamed maple, with a spruce soundboard. The rosette and purfling carry a matching theme, and a blue ornamentation. The original had a celluloid material for the blue color, Ive chosen to simply use a blue veneer. French Polished throughout.
Price: $6800 available 6/13/2023 Sold 6/19/2023
Cedar/East Indian rosewood Double-Top guitar
Cedar DT guitar avaliable< this guitar features a Frederich style head with matching diamond ornament in the lower bout side joint. French polished scale is a 650 mm.
Price $7500 SOLD
Antonio de Torres 1864 FE-17
The young Francisco Tarrega acquired his first Torres guitar in 1859, he was 17 years old. According to Emilo Pujol, Torres made this guitar for his own personal use. The story goes, Torres was so impressed with the young Tarrega’s playing, he gave him his own personal guitar. Tarrega played this guitar until 1889 (20 years) until constant use and wear forced forced him to replace it with another instrument.
Miguel Llobet compared his own 1859 Torres with the 1864 and said, “both were superior instruments and very similar to each other, but for me yours (1864) is the best”.
“It was made of maple with the soundboard in spruce, the neck and head in cedar, and the fingerboard of ebony. The size was slightly smaller than the usual one. It’s sound hole and contours were bordered with the finest of inlays of a pale green shade with double herringbone purfling; on the head, the back and the ribs was an exquisite rectangular meander inlay. In additional to the spontaneity of sound, due perhaps to it’s tornavoz, there was a clear warm timbre, as if it were of gold. The balance between the bass and treble was proportionally exact in volume and the duration of it’s vibrations equally generous throughout the fingerboard. It sufficed to finger a perfect chord in order that, by plucking only the three bass notes one could clearly preceive the harmonics of the other strings” — Emilio Pijol, from Antonio de Torres His life and Work, by Jose Romanillos.
This guitar features a 640 scale.
PRICE $8400 SOLD!
Torres "La Leona" available
Perhaps Torres most renowned guitar. Legend has it, Torres refused to sell this guitar, instead he lent it to players of the day like Julian Arcas. It earned the name “The Lioness”, amongst the followers of the day. Later after Torres death, various inquiries were addressed to Torres Daughter seeking to acquire La Leona, she said, she had never heard of “La Leona” but her father had a guitar he called “ La Fea” the ugly one.
Torres never put a finish on this guitar, perhaps the reason he called it the Ugly One. On a side note , I made a La Leona for the renowned guitarist Matt Palmer. Matt flew out and picked it up, we did a weekend of videos with this guitar. Before Matt Left , I told him I wanted to put a couple more coats of French polish on his guitar, but he took it unfinished.
This particular guitar has a 3 piece top in the style of so many Torres guitars. Back and sides of Cypress ( same as original). The original has a Tornavoz, on some La Leona guitars I include a Tornavoz upon request, on this one I didn’t include one. I also modified the original bridge to a more user friendly one with an adjustable saddle.
French polished, and scale 650mm ( same as original). This guitar is exquisite, the sound and response are amazing, very Torres-esq.
Price $5500 SOLD
A new Thames guitar available
This guitar is based on the Torres 1888, shape wise as well as bracing. I had good luck with this style guitar incorporating a few Torres accents along with some of my own. Maple is perhaps my favorite tone wood for the back and sides, and the majority of Torres surviving guitars are maple. This guitar is sweet and lyrical, very satisfying to the nails. Back and sides of Maple with cocobolo stripes in the sides and back. The perfectly quartered spruce top is rich in medullary silk, a bridge with the traditional Torres dumbbell mother of pearl wing inlays. The head is my design also of cocobolo and maple providing a harmonious over all theme. Scale is 650mm and is French polished. Feel free to email me with any questions.
PRICE $7500 SOLD!
Torres 1862 copy
A good friend of mine has the original Torres 1862, he brought it to my shop to leave it with me for the day. I was extremely excited to have a Torres in my hands, a dream come true! I measured everything on it, and this is my first reproduction. As luck would have it, the owner of the original stopped by today and played it, and said it was remarkably close to his original, perhaps a bit better. Ha!
The original has a very unusual blue and pink plastic accent in the rosette and purfling. Some people have suggested it is celluloid. On this copy I went with blue wood veneer instead of the celluloid material. One can only guess what was going through Torres mind using the space age new celluloid.
I made two of these copies, the other one is going to Matt Palmer. String length is 650, same as the original. The body shape is exactly the same as the Torres FE-17. The woods are birdseye, and flamed maple on the sides, the top is spruce, and French polished. There are many photos of the original in my blog page. Please email me of you have any questions.
PRICE $8400 SOLD ON 4/15/2022 Inquire, as I have another in the works
Fantastic Brazilian rosewood Balsa Double Top available
French polished throughout, 650 scale. Smooth, responsive and balanced. Sounds as good as it looks! $9300 Sold
13-String Dresden Guitar available
I’m happy to announce I have a 13-string Dresden Guitar available, I’vehad many inquiries about this guitar, but until now Ive never made a spec Dresden. I named this guitar the Dresden in honor of Weiss famous Dresden manuscript featuring his later works. This guitar can be turned in D-minor tuning, or conventional tuning. The D-minor tuning is the same tuning used for baroque lutes, enabling one to play directly from lute tablature. The D-minor tuning is from the 1st string down FDAFDAGFEDCBA. The lower basses are tuned sharp or flat depending on the key of the piece. If you chose conventional tuning EBGDAE for the first six strings, one can used any bass tuning that works your you can dream up. The beauty of the D-minor tuning is the basses from the 6th string down to the 13th, are tuned diatonically so you have a scale up and down.
I’ve designed this guitar after a German Swan Neck Baroque Lute, of which Weiss invented. The neck is tilted so that the bridge sits in the middle of the lower bout, as did lutes of the period. The tilting of the neck allows the player to ergonomically remain in the same position with the left hand. in other words, if you dont tilt the neck up adding more strings and centering the neck will position your left hand lower, which isn’t as comfortable. The Daipason bass strings are longer than the freed strings allowing the diameters to be less than if they were all stopped at the nut. This makes the basses more lively and they have less sustain than larger diameter strings, keeping the guitar in the tradition of the times.
The Price is $9300 SOLD
Torres FE18 Available
I had an order for a FE18 from a customer last year, so I decided to make an extra one while I was at it — here is the result. Flamed maple back and sides, Engelmann spruce soundboard, and French polished, with the Torres bridge motifs. Sounds sublime! Comes with a hand made case my myself. PRICE $5600. SOLD
Solid spruce/E Indian Rosewood guitar available
New Solid spruce soundboard with East Indian rosewood back and sides accented with birdseye maple center strip. Scale 650 mm. Very open and luscious tone. PRICE $8400. Posted June 2021. SOLD
Torres "La Leona" replica
Torres “La Leona” copy guitar available now. This guitar is an exact replication of the famous Torres ‘La Leona” The Lioness, otherwise known as “La Flea”, the ugly one, with the exception of a more modern bridge solution to the original antiquated non-adjustable design, and minus the tornavos, a very quick response, very well balanced, and surprisingly loud and open. French polished, scale 640mm. Priced at $6300. SOLD
Special Torres style guitar my 1000th guitar
I made my first classical guitar at the age of fifteen, 50 years later I’ve finished my 1000th guitar. I wanted to do something special and unique. The top is a ‘Bearclaw/Moonwood” from Rudolff Fuchs in Germany. I borrowed various Torres themes for inlays and stylings. The back and sides are a combination of birdseye maple and rosewood strips, in the style of one of Torres guitars. The bridge is adorned with the traditional Torres “dumbell” Mother Of Pearl on the wings. The guitar is French polished with a rich amber color bringing out the beauty on the maple and spruce soundboard. The tone is rich and complex, the bracing is the traditional 7 fan design of Torres. Price $8400 …… SOLD
Flamenco Guitar Available
Flamenco Guitar with Mediterranean Cypress, and Spruce Soundboard. Price: $5800.
New Spruce/Balsa DT Brazilian Rosewood Back & Sides
This guitar is the quintessential DT guitar. Volume clarity and response. Sloane tuners with snakewood buttons. Rosette in the style of Torres as well as the famous meander inlay on the back. Can be heard and seen in the video below. Price $7500. SOLD
Brazilian Rosewood cedar DT, Raised fingerboard, 640 scale, availible.
French polished, Brazilian rosewood 640 mm scale with raised fingerboard. SOLD
Brazilian rosewood/Cedar DT available
Brazilian rosewood back and sides with the Torres meander pattern accent. Top is cedar/balsa-wood with my unique grid core. French polished throughout. Scale is 650 mm. Very powerful and responsive with a delicate attack enabling the player a dynamic color palette. One of the most beautiful guitars I’ve made. Gotoh premium tuners. This guitar comes with a Hiscox Artist series flight case, in either Ivory or black color, see photos below. Price $8400. 4/20/2019. Sold 4/25/2019.
Cedar Balsa wood core DT guitar available 1/20/2019.
Very powerful/responsive, poppy trebles, and punchy dark aggressive basses. One of my best DT guitars to date! Sloane tuners with snakewood buttons. Price $7500. Comes with a Hiscox Pro II case. SOLD.
