Photo by Brandon Iwamoto
For many people, music is an art form. From Beethoven on a grand piano to Hendrix and his Fender Strat, musicians are revered for their skill and the mastery of their instruments.
But what about the people who create those instruments?
In a small workshop on the eastern edge of Fort Collins, covered in sawdust and surrounded by exotic woods, Michael Bashkin is creating art.
He is the owner of Bashkin Guitars and a full-time luthier. Luthiers are expert craftsman, like carpenters, who specialize in creating and repairing stringed instruments, according to the Guild of American Luthiers Web site.
Since opening his shop in 1998, Bashkin has worked to bring 41 years of life into his craft, building custom acoustic guitars for enthusiasts around the world.
“When you get into the high-end, handmade market, you have to be firing on all cylinders,” Bashkin says. Lutherie is a careful combination of art and science, something that is a constant challenge, he adds.
“I had no money and no experience,” says Bashkin of his humble beginnings. He moved to Fort Collins 15 years ago, working as a research associate in the Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory at Colorado State University while attending graduate school for forestry.
It was during this time that he took an interest in lutherie and began an unpaid repair apprenticeship at the former Fort Collins shop, Osprey Guitars. Bashkin credits his time there as an invaluable learning process.
“One of the funny things about guitar making is it’s a craft spent a lifetime learning,” Bashkin says. He built his first guitar from a kit in 1994, using tools he borrowed from Osprey. “Work I’ve done in the past is a snapshot of where I was at the time.”
Bashkin has now created nearly 100 guitars, most of which are commissioned by specific buyers. He also sends a select number to dealers in the United States, Japan, Italy and England. Though he still plays on occasion, he does not own one of his own guitars.
“Within eight bars of playing [a Bashkin guitar], I said, ‘That’s it, this is what I’m looking for,’” says Larry Jacobsen in a phone interview, who is a pastor from Cheyenne, Wyo., and the owner of a Bashkin guitar for four years. “It surpassed everything I hoped.”
Bashkin has no formal artistic training, but his guitars reflect his rich history. After earning an undergraduate degree in forestry from the University of Montana, he worked an eclectic mix of jobs. Among other things, he spent time in Belize teaching tropical forestry and was a photography assistant in New York City.
These two experiences had an enormous impact on his approach to guitar building. Bashkin prefers to use tropical hardwoods for the sides and backs of his guitars. One of his models, the African Blackwood 12 fret, is a nod to his appreciation of black and white photography.
“In a guitar, you’re balancing aesthetics, protection and acoustics,” says Bashkin of the process. He builds guitars in batches of two to six at a time, working closely with each client to make sure the instrument fits their specific needs. Each guitar takes between 80 and 100 hours to complete, spread over a period of about six months. Bashkin ensures every component is ideal, down to necks tailored to perfectly fit a client’s hand.
“The craftsmanship is outstanding and the sound is outstanding,” says Mike Joyce in a phone interview. Joyce owns San Diego-based Luthiers Collection, one of two shops in the nation certified to distribute Bashkin Guitars. “He does some little things in aesthetics and construction that sets himself apart from other craftsmen.”
The construction of a guitar involves thousands of individual steps, a process Bashkin describes as “a terrible model of efficiency.” Despite a base price of $5,500 and a backlog of nearly two years, Bashkin is not driven by profit. According to him, he builds because of a deep passion and interest in his craft.
Photo by Brandon Iwamoto
In his approach to guitar making, Bashkin is meticulous and precise. Before making any cuts, he draws a full-size picture of the guitar and hangs it on the wall in his workshop. This part of the process is vital: if one curve or shape is off, the entire guitar suffers.
“If it’s not good on that very basic, silhouette level, the guitar won’t work aesthetically,” Bashkin says. He describes this blueprint stage as a very instinctual process. Bashkin may refine a drawing 20 times before he is satisfied.
Jacobsen notes that Bashkin takes longer than some other hand-builders, but it is because he simply won’t tolerate any flaws. “It’s almost like a balloon. If you put your finger in one spot, it changes everything else,” Bashkin says.
After he has a perfect blueprint, Bashkin begins the building process. Unlike some luthiers, he does not rely on intricate inlays and fancy flourishes to make his guitars stand out. Instead, he focuses on one of the most vital components of any guitar – the wood itself.
“I try and place an emphasis on celebrating the beauty of the wood in my guitars and not override it with something else,” Bashkin says.
Bashkin’s background in forestry plays a large role in how he selects the wood for his guitars. Each piece is unique, from Brazilian rosewood to Italian spruce, selected for both acoustic brilliance and visual appeal.
“By using different woods he can vary the tone all over the spectrum,” Jacobsen says.
Bashkin values Jacobsen’s knowledge of the “subtleties and intricacies of a guitar,” and the two have developed a friendship based on their appreciation of each other’s talents.
“He’ll have a batch of guitars and turn me loose playing them,” Jacobsen says. He estimates that he has played nearly 35 guitars built by Bashkin, and finds that each one is better than the last.
“I don’t take any responsibility for that [the wood grain],” Bashkin says. “That is the tree. I just try and put it together in a pleasing way.”
However beautiful his guitars are, they are primarily musical instruments. Bashkin looks forward to a guitar leaving his shop almost as much as building it.
Photo by Brandon Iwamoto
“I can build a race car, but I can’t build a race car driver,” says Bashkin of the thrill he gets knowing his instrument is in the hands of a musician, though he admits some of his clients “played some guitar in college,” and are not always experts. Many are looking for the “emotional and spiritual connection” inherent to custom guitars and music itself, Bashkin says. This level of personal attention keeps Bashkin in business.
“I have never met a hand-maker that didn’t want his next guitar to be the best guitar he ever built,” Jacobsen says. It is this philosophy that separates luthiers from mass-production retailers.
“I find that when you take the constraints off a builder and let them be creative, that’s when they really flourish,” Joyce says.
“The difference between the factory market and the custom market is intention,” Bashkin says. He notes that it is often safer for a factory to “overbuild” a guitar by using inferior materials, resulting in an unpredictable product. Hand-builders take into account the variability of their materials in order to make every guitar exceptional, he says.
“I like to think the end product is better because of the process,” Bashkin says. “It can have a meaning beyond its basic material. It can be a work of art.”
Tags: Volume 5 Issue 1
