- Personal Selection Leonardo for Sale
- A Man You Don’t Meet Every Day. RIP – Archie Fisher
- John Smith. Why? Guitar
- He Sells his Stickers on His Merch Stall.
- Judie Tzuke
- Rachel Fuller
- Gordon Giltrap and John Etheridge. Two Parts Guitar
- Indian Rosewood and Sitka Spruce Personal Selection Alexander for Sale – SOLD
- Remi Harris. Tuning your picking hand
- Jon Wilks. From A Lullaby Kiss
- George Sansome. Menuet I – Bach Cello Suite in G Major
- Holly Clarke at the Workshop
- Toby Hay. Coed Trees
- Chris While and Julie Matthews with Ken Nicol. Are We Human
- Jez Lowe. A Message from My Mandolin
- Stevie Coyle. MFG Fylde Magician
Personal Selection Leonardo for sale
Personal Selection Walnut Leonardo
One of the reasons we enjoy the Ullapool Festival so much is that we have an excuse to make instruments to our own specifications. We can choose the technical details and the materials, have our favourite artist play the guitar, then find a perfect match when we come to sell it. We don’t really need an excuse, we simply enjoy doing it.
I’d planned in advance to have demonstration videos made while we were there, and decided what to make based partly on who was going to play them.
I’ll explain more of that in the video below
For this guitar I chose the best pieces of figured Claro Walnut to pair with the fine dark Sinker Redwood soundboard. The neck is made from Walnut and Mahogany, all possible only because we have such “extensive” timber stocks. Gotoh tuners, 45mm neck with Abalone Diamond inlays.
It’s a 12 fret long scale, placing the bridge just where it wants to be to achieve a big, rich, warm balanced tone. A beautiful little giant of a guitar.
For sale at £7,400
Will McNicol plays "A Cornish Tune" on the Personal Selection Leonardo
We made this guitar with Will in mind as the “demonstrator”. His style of playing suits a 12-fret instrument perfectly, and I knew he would bring the best out of this guitar. It’s a very “floaty” tune , and I’ve just realised that Sam used it to accompany my “Spitfire Flight” video (May 2024 newsletter)
A Man You Don't Meet Every Day. RIP - Archie Fisher
Farewell Archie. To me, this song has always been about Archie, in fact, I thought he had written it himself until I was firmly corrected. I couldn’t find a video of him playing this song, but it’s enough for me to listen to the music and look at the picture, it’s just about exactly how he will be remembered, almost “Marlborough Man”. I think he would have loved to have been a cowboy. In his later years, he almost did.
He was a dear friend, and we all have many cherished memories.
The man with the brown velvet voice. The gentlest of souls and perhaps the only songwriter on this side of the Atlantic who would write songs about Ford Transit vans, air speed record aeroplanes and railway stations in the rain. Who else would title an Album “Sunsets I’ve Galloped into”?
The man who taught me to play “Hey Hey”, bought me a three-dimensional Chess set, and connected me to Davy Graham.
Archie was also largely responsible for my love of Single Malt Whisky. Thank you, Archie.
John Smith. Why? Guitar
I think this says it all really. Our work fits in with these sentiments very neatly. Yes, guitars are the centre of our world, and yes, life is certainly tough. For fifty-two years and counting, Fylde has been making instruments for such people as John, supplying the tools for them to express themselves, made to meet individual needs.
It’s a privilege to work with all these amazing musicians. Nothing is easy, guitar making as a living is not the joyful, gentle work that you might imagine. It’s hard and can be unpleasant and unhealthy. The other parts of a business – the paperwork, regulations, shipping, finance etc can overwhelm all the joy of working with your hands.
But to see a professional on stage in front of an audience, using an instrument that we have made is one of the most fulfilling experiences I can imagine. It’s almost as if we are on stage ourselves. It’s when I’m sitting in an audience that I get my best ideas.
He Sells his Stickers on His Merch Stall.
John has made another of those YouTube shorts, extending his views on the value of guitars in his life, but you’ll have to look for it yourself. Also, he is selling these rather nice stickers at his live shows. He sells his stickers on his merch stall. Say it as fast as you can.
Judie Tzuke
John Smith has been at it again, setting me up with new contacts as he meets them on his travels.
Judie’s big hit was “Stay with me till dawn” in 1979, and she is still recording, still touring.
Her guitar up till now has been a Tony Zemaitis acoustic originally made for Mary Hopkin, but now under a little threat from her new “Smithcaster”.
Judie in her turn has now connected me to one of her own professional contacts. That’s how a lot of our orders arrive, from professional artists who have met up with existing Fylde players.
Rachel Fuller
Rachel got in touch a few weeks before Ullapool, she had an ongoing project requiring a Bog Oak guitar, and Gordon Giltrap gave her my name. We had already started to make a suitable guitar for the festival, and I had to decide which way to go. Also of course, there were deadlines and delivery challenges, guitar making is the easy part.
But it all worked out very nicely.
Rachel is a composer married to Pete Townshend. She wrote an adaptation of The Who’s Quadrophenia for the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and London Oriana Choir, along with tenor Alfie Boe. Rachel is “very well connected” and is a songwriter and performer in her own right
She has already used the guitar in a recording session and had her guitarist play it like a Cello, with a bow! I’m hoping for more on this story soon, but you can follow the project by clicking here.
Gordon Giltrap and John Etheridge. Two Parts Guitar
I’m a bit surprised there weren’t more videos of these concerts, they were very well attended and received lots of praise for the music. It’s wonderful to see Gordon playing his Fyldes so much nowadays and also to see him writing, performing and recording as well as ever.
When I showed John some guitars a few years ago, he said they were the easiest to play he had ever known. I’m here John!
Photo © Sue Holton 2025
Indian Rosewood & Sitka Spruce Personal Selection Alexander for Sale
Indian Rosewood and Sitka Spruce Personal Selection Alexander for Sale
A simple instrument, long scale, identical in principal to John Smith’s but using less restricted timbers and a full gloss finish. Laminated Mahogany neck, with Rosewood lines and red borders to match the bindings. Gotoh Tuners, Pearl diamond inlays, 45mm neck.
The Alexander is becoming a classic design, and this combination of timbers is probably the “classic” acoustic guitar, it has the headroom and volume for forceful, strong playing but is also responsive and clear for more delicate moments
For Sale at £5,400 – SOLD
Tristan Seume. Plays “Middle Child” on a Custom Alexander
Tris is another friend who is kind enough to demonstrate for me. He has chosen a very difficult composition to play which of course does demonstrate just what is possible. The quick response on a guitar like this is probably most suited to those fast passages than other guitar might be.
Using video to show features of a guitar is interesting, I’ve always found it useful to examine reflections in a glossy soundboard, as any stress and distortion shows so clearly, it’s one of the reasons why I dislike a matt finish.
Remi Harris . Tuning your picking hand
There are plans to have Remi’s Peter Green show at Ullapool next year, which will be yet another reason for buying your tickets now.
But in the meantime, learn a bit more about the way Gypsy jazz playing works . Then you could buy a Remi Harris Signature guitar from us.
Jon Wilks. From A Lullaby Kiss
Jon’s playing on this reminds me a bit of Martin Simpson, which is hardly a surprise, as it was Martin that put us in touch, and helped a lot in deciding what the guitar should be.
“Two years on, Gwendolyn is playing just fine and maturing wonderfully. She’s become a real companion – a wonderful gigging instrument as well as a studio one. I’m currently on the 17th date of a 20-date tour, and she’s taken everything in her stride”.
There we are again – taking the time to work out what an artist needs from a guitar. To me, it’s never been about a list of choices that a customer specifies. It’s about digging down into the music and style of playing. Conversations, listening, demonstrating. It’s there somewhere, just a question of translating between two sets of learned experience- the maker, and the player, and finding the answer in amongst big piles of wood.
George Sansome. Menuet I - Bach Cello Suite in G Major
What a joy to receive this out of the blue. Holly Clarke told me that she had been with George at Halsway Manor while he was practising it, I think he’s done a splendid job, he’s taken it straight from the “sheet” and inevitably added a few tiny twists of his own.
George’s Orsino sounds so good!!
Holly Clarke at the Workshop
Martin Simpson asked me to contact Holly and I’m so glad I did; she is instantly likeable and super talented. It helps that her family is close by, but she also is one half of a duo with George Sansome and helps run the Saltburn Folk Festival, near to one of our favourite places, so we already had things in common.
Martin had come across an old Fylde Falstaff which he thought was lovely and I mentioned that I had one at work that needed a good home. The way it all worked out with Holly could almost have been scripted from that conversation, you can see the way it worked out in the video. Holly is very happy.
Some of my audio isn’t particularly clear, I’m concentrating very hard on what I’m seeing and hearing from Holly and I’m not at all comfortable being filmed at the same time, plus I should have had a haircut, a shave and a clean sweater.
But it’s folk music so that’s not allowed anyway.
Toby Hay. Coed Trees
This video must have been a challenge, but what a lovely place.
Toby has released a 4 track EP in collaboration with the Radnorshire Wildlife Trust.
“Wilder Pentwyn Farm has a 30-year vision to bring nature back in full, making space for local food production, holding back water and providing opportunities for income generation”
All income from the sale of this release will go to the Trust. Find out more here
Chris While and Julie Matthews with Ken Nicol. Are We Human
Three Fylde Guitars and an upright bass ( with position markers on the fingerboard!).
We haven’t seen Ken play live for several years, we must do something about that, but we do manage to see Chris and Julie from time to time because they have lots of connections near to us. We caught them a few weeks ago at a lovely theatre in Wigton which we knew nothing about. There are a lot of small venues run by volunteers in our towns and villages, bigger towns have already “developed” many such things out of existence, and I worry that the remaining ones won’t survive regulations and inevitable change.
We will be making a point of attending this one, now we know where it is, and how to find a parking space.
The collective age of the guitars in this video is about 110 years. The collective age of the guitarists is another matter entirely. Just saying.
Jez Lowe. A Message from My Mandolin
A fun song about having your instruments stolen then getting them back. This has happened to Jez more than once and I’ve usually been able to provide replacements quite quickly. Last time it happened that wasn’t possible, and I’ve had to watch him playing some other make of bouzouki. Grrr.
The chap sitting on the front row is obviously a guitar player.
Eric Bibb. New Home
Stevie Coyle. MFG Fylde Magician
I know, I know, I spend far too much time on YouTube. I don’t remember how I came across this little delight but I’m glad I did.
Mighty Fine Guitars! Thanks Stevie
That's it for this month.
See you next month!