By Chris Proctor

Guitarists who attend my workshops generally are inquisitive sorts, and they ask me about all sorts of things. One common question has to do with choosing a guitar that is the right size for the player's needs. I have definite and strong opinions on the subject, which I'm happy to share.
When a guitarist picks up a new instrument, all sorts of senses and modes of evaluation come into play, but I think that they generally fall into three main camps:

VISUAL
The eyes tell you whether you like the look of the instrument. Don't scoff at this as being superficial - if cosmetics and design elements didn't count, all instruments would be made of funky woods, with no inlays and cheap binding. Decorative/visual components might not affect the sound of the instrument, yet we players demand good-looking guitars with attractive, straight-grained woods, quality inlays, binding, and other pleasing cosmetic touches. I've never met a player to whom most or all of these factors didn't matter.

AUDITORY
The ears tell you whether you like the way the instrument sounds. Not much objectivity here - some players like a bass-y tone, some like it balanced, some like it clear and bright, and others fat and chordal. That's why there are so many body sizes and wood choices. More on this later.

TACTILE
The body and the hands tell you the rest of the story. Is the body a good size for your playing style and your physical size? Is the neck straight and true, playing dependably in-tune up and down the frets? Is it repairable if something goes wrong? And, finally, is the neck width correct for your intended uses?

Let's compare body sizes by using an automotive analogy. I tend to regard Dreadnought and Jumbo guitars as "sport-utility vehicles" (SUVs). If you want volume or fast single-string runs; if you need to compete with fiddles and banjos or to backup a band; or if you want to accompany your own vocals with powerful strums, the Dreadnought (or Jumbo) is your guitar. A large body, lots of volume, fat bass, and a narrow neck for fast single-string work all make the Dreadnought a logical choice.

Grand Auditorium guitars are perfect all-around "family sedans". For the guitarist who varies his or her playing style (i.e. some flatpicking and some fingerpicking), and who needs the guitar to adapt to situations as divergent as strummed accompaniment and solo fingerstyle, the Grand Auditorium fills the bill. It has done this so successfully, in fact, that since its introduction as Taylor's 20th Anniversary model in 1994, the GA has become the company's most popular body size. It's the guitar that stands up to hard flatpicking and still allows for playing at the other end of the spectrum.

Now we come to my favorite.

Grand Concert guitars are "roadsters", in the tradition of English or German sports cars. If you intend to play a lot of fingerstyle guitar; if you want to record a guitar that won't clutter or muddy your mix; if you're not a huge person and you don't enjoy wrestling with big, deep guitar shapes; if you're a classical player who desires a user-friendly steel-string; or, if you prefer a sound that balances bass and treble and allows the listener to clearly hear the separate voices of your music - the Grand Concert is for you.

The small-body speaks more "immediately", with a clarity that allows the listener and the player to discern the precision and musicality of complicated pieces, moving bass lines, creative inner voices, and singing melodies. But there's more.

I'm also a strong advocate of having the extra wide, 1-7/8-inch neck to complete the package (in this article, all neck-width references are measured at the nut). The Grand Concerts and Grand Auditoriums normally come with a 1-3/4-inch neck width, but I like to push that advantage even further. The fingerstyle guitarist needs a string spacing that allows for separate voices to be played with equal ease with both right and left hands, and the wider neck liberates the player to do just that.

Remember, when a classical player buys a guitar, he or she is given only one neck-width choice: two inches. It's not a hand-size issue, it's a utility-of-use issue. Classical players need the spacing described above for the same reasons that the steel-string instrumentalist needs it. In spite of the 1/8-inch difference between them, Taylor's 1-7/8-inch neck is almost exactly equivalent to the classical two-inch neck in the actual spacing of the strings, because steel strings have thinner diameters than nylon strings.

It's long been a popular, but flawed, belief that only people with big hands should play wide-neck guitars. To refute that thesis, and to fully appreciate that the moving lines and gymnastic chord forms used by the fingerstylist are much more achievable with wider string spacing than they would be on those narrower necks, you need only consider the small hands and stubby, sausage-like fingers of the late virtuoso, Andres Segovia.

From the very first Grand Concert instrument I got from Bob and Kurt in 1984, I have specified the wider neck. Players at workshops I've conducted over the ensuing years have played my guitars and marveled at the ease of play and the comfortable nature of that neck, and Taylor has always made it available as a special-order item. Although it differs from the 1-3/4-inch neck by only one-eighth of an inch, it represents the final piece of the fingerstyle puzzle.

But back to the automotive analogy. Any stock Porsche Turbo should do a pretty good job on the track or the slalom course. Putting the wide neck on a Grand Concert guitar is the equivalent of putting the racing tires and suspension package on the Porsche - it takes a great machine and makes it the ultimate machine.

There are a couple more items you might want to consider. Wood choices can be difficult, but I'd like to proffer some very subjective guidelines. Cedar tops are warmer sounding; Engelmann spruce tops are a bit stiffer and sustain a little bit longer; and Sitka spruce is the stiffest and brightest of the bunch. Maple backs and sides are the choice of players with more complicated mixes, larger bands, and/or extreme amplification needs, because maple is famous for its ability to add color and to "stand out" without muddying the other tracks. It also is the most feedback-free of these woods. Mahogany is livelier and has a longer decay time; koa even more so; and rosewood has the deepest bass and the longest sustain of the bunch.

I haven't had sufficient experience with walnut to give a considered opinion, other than to say that people seem to like it a lot. My guitar of choice is a 912c (with the wide-neck option, of course). That model's Engelmann spruce/Indian rosewood combination is so lovely to my ears that I recommend it to anyone with solo, instrumental, or recording aspirations. It fills up a mix, has great bass, and the melody and inner voices really sing their own distinctive and discernible songs to the listener.

As I write this, I anticipate receiving vigorous responses from defenders of just about every wood combination there is, and I look forward to agreeing with every one of them. Even among the Taylor fingerstyle clinicians, the only unanimity is on the Grand Concert and Grand Auditorium body sizes (with cutaways). You'll see these discerning gentlemen playing cedar and mahogany, rosewood and spruce, walnut, maple, and koa, and that variety once again makes the point: Vive la difference!

Happy hunting.

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