Walter Verreydt 2011 #166

The guitar maker

Walter Verreydt (1958) was trained as a cabinetmaker and wood sculptor before discovering lutherie.

From the very beginning, he has had the chance to study some beautiful guitars by renowned guitar makers like Bouchet, Fleta, Hernandez-Aguado and others. He also has had good contacts with eminent guitar makers like José Romanillos and Daniel Friederich. This formed a rich source of information for him. In Mittenwald, in the beginning of the nineties, selecting spruce, Walter Verreydt met the German guitar maker Rolf Eichinger, which was the beginning of a long  friendship. Rolf Eichinger made Walter Verreydt more familiar with the Spanish guitar making traditions and techniques during his many visits to Eichinger's Granada workshop. These numerous influences have resulted in Walter Verreydt's very personal style.

In 1999, Walter Verreydt became 1st laureate at the ‘4th Mostra Concorso Internazionale di Chitarra Classica’ in Baveno (It).

Since 1988, Walter Verreydt has taught at the ‘Centrum voor Muziekinstrumentenbouw’ in Puurs (Belgium) www.cmbpuurs.be. With his students he is an active member of the Leonardo Guitar Research (LGR) Project www.leonardo-guitar-research.com , a project which focuses on the use of sustainable, non-tropical woods in acoustic guitar making.

Walter Verreydt is one of the founders of the Cordefactum festival ( www.cordefactum.be  ). To this biennal festival (since 2004), luthiers from different countries are invited and reunited around musical instruments and their construction. Within the context of the festival, different lectures, workshops, expositions and concerts are organized.

An indefatigable researcher, he has been experimenting throughout his thirty years of guitar making so as to better understand the mechanics of the instrument.

It is thanks to him that there has been a renaissance of guitar lutherie in Belgium.

Played by Fernando Espi, Andrea de Vitis and Jan Depreter.

Description

Classical guitar made in 2011 number 166 by Walter Verreydt of Kessel, Belgium.

Labeled, signed and dated by the maker and stamped on the inside: "Wv 166".

Body of flamed maple book-matched and without centre strip. Rosewood bindings.

Waverly-Sloane with ebony buttons.

All shellac french-polished to very high standard.