Tagged As: Cordoba Classical Guitar
Question:
Now that I have a new Cordoba 50R , I want to have it set up. I'm a beginner and upgrading from a $100 guitar after years of being dormant from lessons long ago. I'd like to take up the study more seriously now. My understanding is that it is a good idea to have a new guitar set up, which includes a series of adjustments. My question is: does anyone have any recommendations where I should go to have this done? I'm thinking I should go to a reputable luthier in my area. Are there any directories resources for locating one? And, is that necessary for this new guitar? The guitar was in the show room, played by others--the only one GC had left. I assume I should change the strings at this point? They go out of town very fast, keep going flat after only a couple hours. This relate to my next question: Strings. What string make, strength, would you recommend from this particular Guitar? I've noticed some who recommend the innovative Thomastik-Infeld but im not sure which type to get. Anyone with this same model guitar care to share for me what strings worked best? I have to start somewhere, testing, so I might as well start where others have already found satisfaction. Lastly, someone said they replaced their sattle for better intonation. Any recommendations about this? I notice that the saddle it has is at a slope, higher at the basses and lower and the treble strings. Is that normal for a Classical Guitar? I thought we only found these on Folk Guitars.
Answer:
I owned a Cordoba 50R for about two years, bought it new in 1998 at Guitar Center in Mayfield Heights, Ohio. The instrument I bought was not set up to my liking. (The nut was too high, making it unnecessarily difficult to bar in the lower positions.) I second the recommendation that you locate a luthier nearby to make adjustments. A lot depends on your personal preferences -- as a relative beginner, you might want the strings set relatively low. By the way, the sloped shape of the saddle is common in classical instruments -- particularly those that have a radiused fingerboard (rather than being perfectly flat from bass to treble, there is a slight curve). As for strings, I used the D'Addario Pro-Arte Composites, high tension, and liked them very much. Unless your particular instrument has an obvious intonation problem -- and in that case I would take it back to GC -- the expense of adding a compensated nut and saddle probably isn't justified on the 50R. Paul Jacobsen's web page (www.pjguitars.com) has a nice discussion of all that's involved in correcting intonation problems. Simply replacing the saddle with one that is 'notched' for the G string probably isn't going to be much help. I found that careful tuning did the trick on my Cordoba -- Jerry Klickstein has a nice book entitled Tuning the Guitar by Ear published by Mel Bay that helped me immensely. You can order the book from Elderly Instruments (www.elderly.com) as well as other music outlets. It runs about $8.
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