Guitar building courses “I highly recommend this course to anyone interested in taking this journey into the art of guitar making. It could change your life!” -
Boetie Toerien - Flamenco African Style - Casimi Guitars Course
Make your own dream guitar from drawing-board to finish
Dear friends, We are pleased to continue making this exciting course available! The course is designed for anyone who has a passion for guitars, design, music, working with their hands and/or working with wood. It is not necessary to be an instrument-builder or to have any prior woodworking experience to take part. There are a maximum of six places available on the part time courses and two places on the full time course, so its worthwhile booking well in advance. Luthier, Matthias Roux and designer and inlay specialist, Matthew Rice will guide you through the process from design to completion with great care, experience, humour and attention to detail. All our students leave our courses having created a top quality, hand crafted, custom instrument of their own. We ensure that each student is met at their level of skill and is enabled to learn as much as they can while ensuring their instrument is produced at the highest possible standard. You can read about Casimi Guitars and our design and build philosophy as well as hear and see two of our models in action in the interview we did with The North American Guitar here: http://thenorthamericanguitar.com/blog/casimi-guitars-luthier-interview
Making your guitar The course covers the whole process of building your dream guitar from design to finish. This includes: • Wood selection. • Workshop orientation, setup and safety. The workspace. Basic use of machines and power tools in Luthiery. • Initial concept design and technical drawing. Hand eye coordination and accuracy. Understanding accuracy of flow. • Template and mould making. Basic use of hand tools and power tools. Cutting to template. Processing wood. Thicknessing. • Understanding chisels, planes, rasps, files and sand paper. Cutting tools and techniques. • Construction and fitting. • Bending wood using steam and heat. • Luthiers’ secrets of intuiting wood. Finding and releasing it’s acoustic potential. • Understanding dimensions, thickness and strength to weight ratios for different species of wood. • Introduction to inlay and marquetry. • Advanced hand tool techniques. Secrets of accuracy and precision in hand tooling and Luthery. • Preparing wood for finishing. Understanding proper sanding techniques • Finishing The workshop is a relaxed, sociable, yet highly perfectionist and concentrated environment. As the course progresses, new friends are made, memorable moments are shared and much exciting learning, stretching of body and mind, eating of snacks and drinking of coffee is undertaken. By the end of all this, a miraculous birth takes place as your new guitar is ceremoniously strung up for the very first time and its voice is heard at last. Course Structures: • 18 month part time: One four-hour class per week on Saturdays. • 9 month condensed part time: One full Saturday per week. • 12 week full time Tuesday to Friday. During the 12 week period our workshop will be dedicated to the single purpose of bringing about your dream guitar and helping you to achieve the best possible result. Not only will you be getting a fully-customised, Casimi-built, world-class acoustic guitar, but you get to be part of the process as well. There is no other workshop that we know of where you can participate at this level. We have continued to make this option available because of the emmensly rewarding experience it offers. This course is only available to two students at a time. Applications and bookings must be made one year in advance to secure a place. Course fees: • An initial deposit of R3500 is required to secure your place on the course. This will cover all your workshop consumables and is non-refundable after seven working days. • Monthly fees for the 18 month part time course are R2,222 p/month. • Monthly fees for the 9 month part time course are R 4,444 p/month. • Monthly fees for the fulltime 12 week course are paid in three instalments: R26000 upfront, st R26000 on the 1 of the second month and R28,000 on completion. • The total fee for the 18 and 9 month courses is R40,000 excluding deposit, wood and materials. • Total fee for the 12 week intensive course is R80,000 excluding deposit, wood and materials. (for oversees and out of town students we will help you to find accommodation) • A grace period of 1 month after the completion of the 18 and 9 month course is offered for students to complete any outstanding work, should they need the extra time, After which fees will continue on a pro rata basis until the instrument is completed
• A grace period of 2 weeks after the completion of the 12 week course is offered for students to complete any outstanding work, should they need the extra time, After which fees will continue on a pro rata basis until the instrument is completed • Woods and materials can vary in cost from approximately R5,000 to R10,000. These are chosen by the participants. • A small starter kit will be needed consisting of 1X A3 scetch pad, a 2H and an HB pencil, a small steel ruler, a compass, a square and a portfolio bag or tube. All other necessary tools and machines are provided by the Casimi Guitars workshop. Once the deposit has been paid, we will call a meeting to discuss the selection of your woods and materials. These take between 1 to 3 weeks to arrive once ordered, but work can begin before then on workshop orientation, design blue prints, and templates. By the end of the course each participant will walk away with a world-class, hand crafted instrument built under Casimi supervision. These instruments are valued at R80,000 or more. This guitar will be tailor-made to your unique requirements and design. It may be your greatest friend as a musician, or an amazing collectors investment piece, or both, depending on what you choose to do with it thereafter. For the next hundred years that guitar will mature like a good wine and will sound more beautiful with each passing year. Who knows, maybe three hundred years may pass before it grows silent once again! As such it could become a family heirloom passed down through the generations. We can say with full confidence that this is an experience of a lifetime. If you are interested in having such an experience, give us a call or mail us right away. We look forward to welcoming you on this journey with us, and hope to hear from you soon. For more information, please visit www.casimiguitars.com or mail us at
[email protected] Yours sincerely, The Casimi Guitars team Matthias Roux Director Luthier
[email protected] +2782 928 3525 Matthew Rice Director Designer
[email protected] +2776 474 3119
Course Reviews This course is extremely gratifying and fulfilling. Course presenters (Matthias and Matthew) are knowledgeable, professional, passionate and have extraordinary skills in creating (and teaching how to make) beautiful instruments. The course comes highly recommended but is definitely more than just guitar making. It is a total experience - James Basson – Architect. Casimi offers an amazing view into the wonderful work that's involved in making handmade guitars. You'll leave every session brimming with information and inspiration. Matthias and Matthew have a wealth of knowledge and a level of skill that leaves you in awe of what they do. But most of all, the course is incredibly fun; without a doubt one of the finest experiences of my life so far. - Simon Tamblyn - Artist (Tape Hiss and Sparkle, The Sleepers) The Casimi Guitar experience has made a massive impact on my life and for that and my guitar in my hands at the end of the day, I am deeply thankful. - Aidan Higgs – Student.
Testimonial Boetie Toerien – Body stress release practitioner Flamenco African Style – Casimi Guitars Course Every Thursday evening for eighteen months a group of us would head south along the Cape Peninsula to the guitar workshop where Matthias Roux and his team of luthiers inducted us into the fine art of guitar-making. Very soon this became the high-point of the week for me. Starting each session at around 7 PM in the late evening sunshine of summer through the darkening twilight of autumn to the blackness of winter evenings and back again into the light, six (or was it seven?) unique guitars went through their gestation cycles. The completely different styles of these guitars, the varying combinations of wood selected by the course participants, and the uniqueness of the sound that each instrument finally produced, reflects the personalities and aesthetic choices of their makers. Most of us were not skilled craftsmen. Consequently the exceptional fineness of the finishes and quality of workmanship achieved must be attributed to the brilliance of the luthiers that ran the course and guided us through each stage in the construction of the guitars. One of the lovely aspects of the course was participating in the evolution of each of the other participants’ guitars, sharing their decision processes as they selected design features, and in the process getting to know them well. We were each making our own guitar but we were also involved in the making of the others as we watched and encouraged and criticised and generally participated in each other’s processes. Often at the end of the Thursday sessions we were reluctant for it to end and would head off for late night pizzas in Simonstown. The level of skill and patience required to make a fine guitar went beyond anything I had experienced. Fortunately the course was a stepwise progression into this art which became a joyous process that I looked forward to each week and would miss for nothing. I imagine it required even higher levels of patience from Matthias and his team but they clearly enjoyed it greatly. I am very grateful to them for that experience.
And I love my guitar. It sits on a stand in the lounge as though participating in all conversations. My eye falls on it and I feel a warm glow in my heart. And then I pick it up and strum those nylon strings and I am always surprised by the brightness and the clarity of the sound, and the volume if I decide to be expressive and hit the strings hard. And I stroke the smoothness of it and feel the bevelled edge of African Blackwood that sits softly under my arm and I marvel at its beauty. What sort of guitar is it? It is a flamenco guitar: light woods, bright sound, simple in appearance. Colin Rock, one of the luthiers working with Mathias, had made a beautiful guitar contrasting light and dark woods and I wanted a similar effect. So it has an Engelmann spruce top, Monterey cypress back and sides with a beautiful flare in the wood that only became fully apparent after varnishing; Spanish cedar neck, African ebony finger board and headstock veneers with African blackwood rosette, bridge and bindings. Dark almost black woods contrast with the blonde light woods that give it its bright sound with a thin red line in the bindings around the body and neck the only colour. Brass inlays of San/Bushman figures dance on the rosette depicting the transformation of the hunter-shaman, falling into trance and becoming a therianthrope, half-eland, half-man as he enters the spirit world. Flamenco African style. I highly recommend this course to anyone interested in taking this journey into the art of guitar making. It could change your life!
[email protected]
Casimi Guitars Reviews. Running these courses is a great way for us to share the joy of what we do and love. Our own guitars are a good example of the standard of workmanship we will help you to achieve. Here is what some of the great Guitarists who have sampled our guitars have to say about them:
Michael Watts -
An aficionado of the best of modern guitar lutherie Michael is regularly invited to demonstrate the work of the world's greatest guitar builders at festivals in the USA and Canada. “A ferocious fingerstyle instrument... Quite honestly I can think of few guitars that have this kind of clarity and immediacy of response.” http://michaelwattsguitar.com
http://thenorthamericanguitar.com
Guy Buttery – Renowned SAMA winning finger style guitarist "Casimi Guitars offer a seamless harmony of forward-thinking technology and handmade perfection. Within seconds you realise playing these instruments opens a vast world of possibilities. Rich tonal colours, projection, meticulous and consistent balance, and impeccable design. Casimi Guitars are an inspired fusion of the Old World and the New. For me, all these elements translate into a guitar of Ancient Future." http://www.guybuttery.co.za
Joel Fafard – Award-winning Finger style guitarist “These Guitars sound as good as they look!” www.joelfafard.com
Derek Gripper-
Classical Guitarist, Concert Musician/Educator/Lecturer
“The instrument I played was beautifully constructed from the finest woods. It was light and required no strain to produce a good, clear and strong-bodied tone. The trebles were clear and sparkling, without the mess of upper partials that one often hears in modern guitars. The basses were well integrated into the overall sound and the general feel was that of an instrument that is complete in itself. I would have liked to have spent more time in this guitar's company, to have experimented with different strings and tried to learn its secrets, but from the little time I spent with it I got a strong feeling that this is an instrument that you could explore, probe and ask questions of, an instrument that had something to say, and an instrument which could inspire one to play the guitar with the utmost sensitivity. Aesthetically the instruments from Casimi are forward-looking without being kitsch, or sacrificing the original simplicity of the Spanish guitar's design. I have enjoyed some of the new features of their more recent guitars, the beautiful craftsmanship and designs, which are thought out to the very smallest detail and executed with first-class craftsmanship.” Derek Gripper www.derekgripper.com
For further information please visit our website at www.casimiguitars.com You can also follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/casimiguitars and twitter @CasimiGuitars and keep up to date with the goings on at our workshop and courses @ www.facebook.com/casimiguitars
