Healdsburg Guitar Festival '09

Luthier Mercantile International Inc. hosts a guitar festival every two years. This year happened to be their festival. Being an avid guitar play and an aspiring guitar builder, I decided to go. One of the motivators for going was to meet Greg Nelson of Nelson Guitars. We are both members of Luthier Forum. I have to say that I was incredibly impressed with his guitars. He brought a small body walnut guitar that he had built. Very nice guitar!

I found out when I arrived that a new member of the forum, was going to be there to. It was great to meet Flea and see some pictures of the mandolins that he is building. They look really well built and I look forward to seeing on in person one of these days.

So here's some info about the show. There were over 100 high end luthiers showcasing their work at the show. Needless to say, guitar overload! Here are a few builders that stood out to me.

Geiger Guitars is based out of SoCal. His fingerstyle guitar is well bounced in sound and very comfortable to play. Mark Geiger gave some great advice to a beginning guitar builder. Thanks Mark!

One of the guitar companies that I looked forward to seeing was Goodall Guitars. James is a well known builder who just recently relocated to Fort Bragg, California from Hawaii. They are truly beautiful guitars. Playing them simply backed up their visual beauty.

Ervin Somogyi is a legend in guitar making. His inlays are insane. You have to see his work to believe it.

It's hard to capture all the many great luthiers that were present. You could spend weeks playing all the guitars that were at the show and reviewing them.

If you would like to see some photos, check out the ones that Greg and Flea posted on the Luthier Forum Site.