Phillip de Fremery's technical conversion of 1975
The confrontation was sudden yet it belied an internal drama
which had been a long time coming. As
early as the fall of 1971 the young guitarist began to feel the need to work in
greater detail on his tone. He added
another hour per day to his routine of arpeggio formulas. When at the end of 1972 his speed and
precision had improved, but there had been no qualitative progress with the
tone, he redoubled his efforts for the 1973 season. The following December his sound still had
not improved so he increased the time allotment yet again for 1974, now
spending three hours a day exclusively devoted to the study of tone. Another year brought yet another negative
result and he entered the 1975 season even more determined to solve this
disturbing mystery, investing a solid four hours a day toward his right hand
technique. This was a player who had
always been known for his sound but the situation was now beginning to wear on
him, for on a fairly extensive swing of appearances throughout the five-state
area of the U.S. Northeast late that spring he began to have trouble accepting
applause. After four straight years of
unrelenting work, with the daily outlay of technical study increasing
considerably during each of those years, he was only able to claim progress in
speed capability and tonal finesse. There was no improvement whatsoever in quality of the tone itself. He had never had any desire to become faster
than he already was at the beginning of his career. More and more he had to face the stark and
unforgiving reality that he felt his tone did
not originate within him, that he only felt it forming within the guitar and
going out from there. It was a situation of total disenfranchisement. He decided that his long-submerged hunch was
correct and that he was going to have to cut off his fingernails entirely. In light of the fact that nails formed the
entire basis of the modern concert guitar technique, and although at the time
he could not have realized that his nails were only part of the problem, the
resignation of the Aspen position, which entailed the final training of many
who are now among the acknowledged leaders in the international field, was
virtually a foregone conclusion.
Although his decision to cut off his nails was unequivocal,
he knew that his career as a teacher in the Liberal Arts environment could
continue and for one simple reason: since his abandonment of the fingernail
technique he had never experienced even a shadow of disapproval of the way
others played. He did not admire their
playing any less than he always had. He knew he was hearing their sound, that reality had always been protected; the only task remaining was the discovery
of his own.
As luck would have it he did not have to wait long. In the fall of 1975 he happened upon an Irish
harp. He was running his fingers over
the strings, not paying any particular attention, when something about what he
was hearing leaped into the room. He
became suddenly alert and quickly noticed that the instrument was strung with a
random assortment of strings, specifically he saw that throughout the range
some were nylon and some were gut. And
the sounds which had so forcefully called to him came only from the gut
strings. He paid even closer
attention. All of the gut strings had
longer durations than those of nylon. None of them had any shrillness in the sound, not even the shorter ones
as compared with the longer ones of nylon. More important even than all of this combined was that the sound of the
gut strings on that little half-size harp answered, fully and forever, all of
the questions raised in his agonized search of the previous four years.
Nevertheless – and he
could not have known this at the time – a third factor was preparing to emerge
and form a true partnership with this “new” combination of raw materials. The guitar maker Michael Cone had already
crossed his path at least a dozen times, their first
meeting having taken place in
Aspen
in 1973 over the issue of a small-bodied guitar Cone had just built and was
trying to sell. The new instrument had
generated absolutely no interest anywhere in the Southwest but when the young luthier showed it to de Fremery,
who was in charge in
Aspen
for the first few
days while Oscar Ghiglia was enroute from
Europe
, the reaction was nothing if not
kinetic. The evening session of the
master class had just concluded but no one left the room. Michael Cone stepped
forward and handed over the guitar and de Fremery played it for five or ten minutes. An
appraisal had been requested so he simply said, “for this instrument you may
ask whatever you want – it has extraordinary capabilities.” Cone had not anticipated this reply and was
stunned. One of the performers, a young
professional from
Vermont
,
immediately telephoned home. She
arranged the sale of her (famous) concert guitar, and offered to buy Cone’s
instrument at a price which was accepted, taking possession of the guitar then
and there. Steve Toplitz,
the owner of the Amherst (Massachusetts) Music House, who happened to be
visiting for that night’s session, stayed later into the evening and ended up
commissioning Cone for three guitars, two for his business and one for himself.
In this small chapter of The Life of the Guitar it was an
occasion of considerable moment. Cone
and de Fremery remained in touch, the three new guitars for Steve Toplitz were built
that fall in
San Luis Obispo
,
California
and were soon
delivered in person by Cone, who announced in the process that he was
relocating to the Northeast. For the
next several years his guitars were made available not only in
Amherst
but through Bob Page at the Classical Guitar Store in
Philadelphia
. And -- on the occasion of the discovery of gut strings on the Irish harp
– there was one other person in the room
and that person was Michael Cone.
So in 1973 the two men began a conversation which continues
to this day and which has since made manifest both of de Fremery’s concert guitars, the original from 1976 and the second instrument from 2007.
Two critical factors in this “new” equation of
smaller-bodied instruments being played without fingernails, and on gut
strings, become immediately apparent. Gut is noticeably higher tension than nylon. In addition, with the fingernails gone and a
surface area of considerably greater mass suddenly in play, the guitarist is in
a position to generate forces of exponentially greater magnitude. (those who find themselves interested in the
physics of all this will observe that when one plays without nails the string
can be pulled much farther back – and further back at many different angles –
before it is released, and that when one thinks of this from the point of view
of archery, for instance, the implications are interesting to say the least –
and if we add in that the Michael Cone bridge saddle establishes a full 2 5/8
inches between the 1st string and 6th string, these
possibilities are even further expanded) Finally, we note that the smaller instruments inherently produce
considerably higher string resistance than do the modern, larger designs which originate
in the celebrated work of Torres.
Since Michael Cone was already interested in building
instruments with smaller bodies, and since the original of those had created
such a stir in
Aspen
,
this design was given a total green light. (these instruments are small but only to the eye – the string length is
a full 65.5 centimeters – in short there is nothing about them which suggests a
copy of an 18th or 19th century guitar, they are in fact
fully modern in their design) So what
stands revealed is that three separate factors converge to elevate the
implications of higher string tension: 1) the builder’s design forces the tension up, 2) the gut strings have far higher
inherent tension than do those of nylon, and 3) with no fingernails for the
player to be afraid of breaking, there
is a much greater physical mass available to be delivered to the string.
One other breakthrough came, quite unexpectedly, in 1994,
when out of the blue Richard Cocco, President and
C.E.O. of E. & O. Mari, Inc., provided de Fremery with prototype versions of varnished gut strings. These were immediately recognized as being
equal in tone to the normal gut treble yet they were practically indestructible
– the life span of the traditional (unvarnished) gut 1st string had
heretofore been about ten days, while the varnished gut 1st string
lasts on average between two and three months, even under heavy usage. This brilliant technical advance erases what
had once been an important concern on the part of the professionals.
When asked whether, given the implications of his findings,
he plans to reclaim his concert career, de Fremery is
both articulate and adamant in pointing out that he has followed this sequence
only because to have ignored any part of it would have been tantamount to
abandoning his lifelong love affair with the repertoire of the modern concert
guitar. He is not interested in becoming
the next advocate of this instrumental technique. He was simply forced to face the fact that if
he wished to continue playing the guitar with the same intensity of feeling
that he had at the very beginning, he was going to have to follow his
instinctive requirements of the sound wherever they led him, no matter
what. And, fully aware of the fact that
in the Age of the Internet he is in a position to stay home, perform locally
and simply export work should the demand arise, he also points out that through
the centuries the fingernail/no-fingernail pendulum has been swinging way too
far in both directions, and that the surviving accounts of any stage of this
debate are transparently vicious and adolescent in their natures. In his estimation, for this to have taken
place even just once is not only a disgrace but it is endemically corrosive and
as such it constitutes a cruel repudiation of the true nature of the guitar.
“Many systems have come and gone and yet somehow they are
all still here. The guitar is wonderful
in all of its manifestations. Some even
feel the guitar is the most beautiful instrument of them all. In any case, sound represents by far the most
profound personal commitment a performer can ever hope to establish. So all that really matters
is that those who love the guitar should play it. That still, small voice will always be a
miracle in this world, on levels both personal and universal.”
Toward this end we may safely say that since the concert
guitar is now at the virtual zenith of its popularity, and since the prevailing
technique is overwhelmingly based on the use of the fingernails, we may yet
have the opportunity to conclude for the first time in history that players who
have weak or otherwise inadequate nails may still lead a very rewarding life
with the guitar, up to and including the avenue of public performance. The means of production on both sides of the question
are different but there is no escaping the fact that in both instances the
dynamic range is rich and full. The
ancient option of playing without the use of the nails is now proven to be as
practical and available as any other. This will literally be music to the ears of many who either could not
grow their nails or could not keep them. For further detail on the playing of the guitar without fingernails, please follow this link.
