# How important is the quality of the guitar we play?...



## rubendiaz (Jun 23, 2009)

Is it the same if we play with a good guitar rather than…

by Ruben Diaz

www.rdiaz.org

How important is the quality of the guitar we play?...

The guitar is an instrument what is an instrument?
According to the Oxford dictionary 

— ORIGIN Latin instrumentum ‘equipment, implement’.

It is like a bridge between the audience or public and the artist which is supposed to convey a message with music so, we can not say that any bridge that does not fall apart is good enough…,or can we?
In my opinion there are some big misconceptions about what a good guitar in our hands can make, must common are as follows:

1)the supposition that is the player what counts and not the guitar.

but can even the best car driver be same effective on a bad vehicle?...
often we underestimate the importance of the tone and quality that a guitar should have in order to allow us to give the best of ourselves to the audience, the tuning factor is essential, since we guitar players already go half life tuning and the other half thinking we already tuned!...
but apart from that, I think the guitar is like a window trough which the public see us, so if it is not perfectly clear, it can distort our image, and by playing in a daily basis with the wrong guitar we can even take this distortion of our real sound 
as “the way I sound”
I will quote an example that a dear teacher once gave to me: A biologist once demonstrated an experiment on a frog. Bringing a pot of water to a boil, he dropped a live frog into it and the scalded animal immediately jumped out of the water to safety. The biologist then put the frog into another pail of water, this time at room temperature, and heated it slowly. Several hours later, the frog had boiled to death, because it had not sought escape from the gradual increase in heat.
Means we become habituated to a determinate thing and then we don’t notice the boiling…

Nonetheless we can become used to the right guitar with same easy and, then we may feel the difference….

I often hear some students saying “I am very beginner so for me does not change anything if the guitar I practice with is not of good quality, when I will play really good then I will buy a nice one”

That (imo) is another mistake since just because he is a beginner its even more important for him to learn in a nice guitar, for he will become used to a way of tuning and to specific measurements,(for example many times in bad quality guitars we can see that the distance between each string in the right hand bridge are different, or uneven, that is, the wholes were drilled not very carefully, sometimes people say, “well its just one millimetre out, so what’s the big deal?” I had a student who played for some 2 years with a guitar that had this problem, and when he finally could get rid of it, he experienced difficulty to play with the proper guitar, just like if we use shoes that are uneven one higher than the other for a long period, if after we change to the right ones one would feel awkward.
Others say “well this and that guy had also guitars with the wrong uneven distance, and there are many other students with guitars like that, and some are even expensive ones so what is the problem?”…

And I say: Where it is said that two wrongs make one right?...

I understand that some people buy an expensive guitar that is defective and they are not easy at acknowledging it, because they were cheated and you know…we don’t want to appear as fools etc.
Beside the fact that a good guitar does not mean necessarily a very expensive one, although you know better that me that we can not buy diamonds with 3 dollars…,so good things are generally expensive, but that’s why it is not acceptable (imo)
that an expensive guitar have this kind of evident defects, the guitar should be flawless ideally, I ask Paco about this and, he is very picky about so many subtle details…It will be to explain in a whole book about all his insights on this…

(if you want to know more you can read 
http://www.rdiaz.org/rdpacoart2.html
http://www.guitarfoundation.org/drupal/node/4892 )

Like even specific distance of what the left hand nut should have from the string to the edge of the fret board for example etc, so I learn so much from this hidden nuances that he kindly disclose, and he says I would never play with this and this defect, not that “I am Paco De Lucia and I play great in ANY guitar” I thank him because he generously taught me so many of this subtleties, I know that as he himself said it is very personal issue but, because I voluntarily follow his line and teachings strictly, after 20 years or so I came to the conclusion that there are certain facts that are not so personal and rather applicable to all guitar players.

Anyway I would like to know about your personal opinion and insight on this subject matter so that it can be of help for the research on this topic and as an aid to aspiring guitar players of all styles and countries, its always good to learn from others, therefore I request you to please send your comments on this interesting aspect often taken for granted or ignored and expand our knowledge through the experience that other players have with the guitar.

Thanks 
your friend 
Ruben Diaz
[email protected]


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

I think it's nice to learn on a quality instrument, and you're right that quality does not mean $1000+.

That said, a) you have to know what to look for and b) not everyone can afford a quality guitar for their first - even if it Is "cheap".

It's like my friend said to me once "If you can afford to, go out and get the best. If you can't, go out and buy the best you can with what you've got."

There's also the whole thing about guitar set ups and what's ideal for some isn't ideal for others - a set-up can take an "ok" guitar to a "pretty good" guitar


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## zontar (Oct 25, 2007)

Budda said:


> It's like my friend said to me once "If you can afford to, go out and get the best. If you can't, go out and buy the best you can with what you've got."


I've heard the same thing--basically-Buy the best you can afford.
That doesn't mean if you can afford $1000, to buy the $975 guitar over the $750 guitar, but to buy the best guitar that's $1000 or less. 

Of course if you're not sure which that is, a guitar playing friend is a good thing.


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## Steadfastly (Nov 14, 2008)

On a scale from 1 to 10, probably a 3. Many professional musicians started on a very poor quality instrument. Dedication and determination are one of the most valuable assets worth way more than any instrument.


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