Luthier Ben Wilborn Building Masterpiece Guitars
Ben Wilborn is a Luthier (Guitar Builder) who has masterfully created a unique collection of hand made acoustic guitars. Each guitar is crafted with an absolute commitment to quality by a creator that is engulfed with passion for string instruments and music. Ben, has spent his whole life listening closely to guitars, mandolins and violins, searching for that special quality that makes an instrument popular and desired to be played. Ben has studied a zillion instruments and listened to the way each responds to the musician's touch and how they reflect sound in different environments. Ben's passion as a builder is to create instruments that can respond intimately to a player’s intention, and become as much an extension of the body as a beautiful tool for the creation of music. This short video created by Sharktooth Productions, directed and filmed by Lonny Dill is just a small taste of a few days in the life of Master Luthier Ben Wilborn.
Category
🎵
MusicTranscript
00:00My father was an amateur woodworker.
00:24He had a shop when I was growing up in the basement.
00:27It was always a place of great mystery and wonder to me.
00:30You'd go down there and there were all these tools, there was danger, and you could make
00:37things.
00:38I thought that was just amazing.
00:42So I had that in my early childhood.
00:45I mean, from the very get-go, I thought about building things as just something that you
00:52do.
00:53My dad taught me a lot of the basic early stuff, so I've had a lifetime's exposure
01:02to fabricating with wood thanks to him.
01:14When I'm finishing a guitar, I want it to be as close to perfect as I can possibly get
01:18it.
01:19I mean, I want to be able to read text in it.
01:21I want to look down and see that I need to shave when I'm looking into the pooled reflection.
01:25Ah, they're just so beautiful when they're freshly polished and the wood is underneath
01:31there.
01:32They really do.
01:33They remind me of a mountain stream.
01:36The main advantage that one of my guitars would have over a factory-made guitar is the
01:45lightness of the build.
01:47I build my guitars fairly lightly, quite lightly actually, and frankly, factories can't
01:54afford to do it.
01:56I mean, there's no room for error.
02:02Well, music has always been part of my life.
02:05I started playing the violin when I was six years old.
02:08I played violin as a classical player until I went to college, and then I went to Berklee
02:15College of Music where I started studying jazz.
02:21I've always loved guitars more than violins, even though I'm a much more accomplished violinist
02:26than I am a guitarist.
02:34But I hardly play the violin anymore.
02:36I love guitars.
02:37I love the completeness of the instrument.
02:39It's a whole orchestra you sit, you hold in your lap.
02:46I didn't build a guitar until I was 40 years old.
02:50When I did, the angels sang.
02:54I was able to bring these two things together that I love so much, music and fabrication.
02:59It takes me between 80 and 100 hours to make a guitar, depending on the level of the complexity
03:05of the cosmetic.
03:10I think you have to have a sentimental relationship with your instrument.
03:14You have to be emotionally invested in it.
03:20I want an instrument to sound good.
03:22I want it to smell good.
03:23I want it to feel good, and I want it to look good.
03:26These are all critical.
03:28I've sold guitars to excellent musicians and amateurs alike.
03:33As long as someone gets it, and they sit down, and they play, and they feel the guitar,
03:37and they make a connection to it, my job is done.
03:45This is the moment I've been waiting for.
03:47I've just strung up this guitar.
03:48This is called Old Paint, and it's called Old Paint because this wood reminded me of
03:52an old paint horse, sort of the beautiful brown and tans.
03:56This is Myrtle.
03:57It has sort of a western theme, a bunch of fingerprints on here.
04:01Western theme with the rope, purfling, and the stars, I've got stars, nice white tuning
04:09pins.
04:10I don't know.
04:11This is it.
04:12This is what you wait for, you know?
04:14And I love the voice.
04:16It's sweet.
04:19Old Paint.
04:25Old Paint.