❌SOLD❌ Lester DeVoe Flamenco Blanca Guitar, 2000

A Lester DeVoe flamenco guitar is an unusual instrument to come across. DeVoe is regarded as on of the world’s best flamenco constructors and is based in Nipomo, California.

DeVoe came to lutherie in a not unusual way. He was taking classical and flamenco guitar lessons, intending on a career as a musician, but could not find an instrument to match the quality of his teacher’s 1924 Santos Hernandez guitar. Frustrated in his search, he started to build. Since 1975, he has been producing high quality Classical and Flamenco guitars, with the best guitars as his benchmark.

Here we have a Lester DeVoe Flamenco Blanca guitar, built during 2000 at Devoe’s shop in Nipomo, California. Both the label and the inside of the top – next the the upper bass bout – are signed and dated by DeVoe.

This wonderful guitar follows the traditional Spanish construction style, with a Spruce top and bracing (DeVoe normally uses European Spruce) paired with Cypress for the back and sides. The neck and heel are Spanish Cedar, with the sides slotted into the ‘slipper heel’. The fingerboard is Ebony, while the bridge and head plate are Indian Rosewood. The tuners appear to be Flamenco – traditional friction models, but are in fact geared PegHed models, a subtle yet dramatic improvement. The top has two protective thin plastic plates – one the traditional full size Golpeador and a small strip behind the tie block, protecting the top from the string ends.

As typical of Flamenco guitars, this is very light at 1.36kg or 2.99 lbs. The nut is a fairly wide 54mm, and it has a long 656 mm scale length.

Overall, this guitar is in quite good shape. Flamenco is a rather physical style, and it’s common for the top to mark – this accounts for the common tap plates. Here, there is light marking from fingertips on the top’s bass side of the fingerboard tag. The finish is otherwise clear and clean, and naturally sinking into the wood’s pore structure. DeVoe uses either lacquer or French Polish, and in both cases the applied finish is thin so as to not restrict the resonance of the guitar.

DeVoe’s current pricing for this model is $8,700 US.

The original black Hiscox case is included.