MUSI3041 Assignment#4 The Ecological Sustainability of Guitar

Material & making process

A guitar is mainly made of five parts: top, side, back, neck, and fingerboard. Among them, the soundboard is the defining part of the guitar. Since it is sliced thinly yet does not break under the tight string tension, it must be both solid and flexible. It also has to be light and reverberate responsively because it determines the tonal qualities. In the making process, the slices of wood are cut to the growth rings at a right angle to ensure stability and sound wave projection, so only large-diameter logs are chosen. Because of these, only a very small percentage of old-growth trees can be used for guitar manufacturing. 

At Pacific Rim Tonewoods north of Seattle, a Sitka spruce log is prepared for splitting and quartersawing (cut radially) into thin, soundboard pieces.

Based on centuries of experience, artisans have found that spruces(Picea) are the most appropriate material for both classical and acoustic guitars’ soundboards. For sides and backs, rosewoods(Dalbergia species) and maple(Acer species) are usually chosen; for fingerboards, ebony(Diospyros species); for necks, mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla) or maple. After having these timbers, artisans will carve, sand, and assemble them.

Ecological sustainability

For so long, the source of the guitar's raw material supply chain has been a mystery. As a matter of fact, there are various sources of wood, such as spruces from the Pacific Northwest, rosewoods from Brazil, Madagascar, and India, and mahogany from Fiji and Central America, that come from regions with a history of environmental struggle, colonial violence, and dispossession. 

 

Sitka spruce in the Hoh Rainforest in Olympic National Park

The most typical material is spruce. Over 800 years old and growing to heights of more than 300 feet, Sitka(Picea sitchensis) is the largest and longest-lived spruce. The Sitka spruce trees used as soundboards typically survived for at least 400 years. It makes an exquisite sound due to its sluggish growth and tight growth-ring nature. However, the old-growth Sitka forests are in danger of extinction due to clear-cutting. Additionally, new-growth trees generally have lesser density wood and develop considerably more quickly, with wider growth rings. Bedell guitar, a brand that is very niche and professional, has existed for 58 years and has its place in the history of American rock music. They are committed to complete transparency, from seed to song, and never utilize tonewood from clear-cut forests. In collaboration with Alaska Specialty Woods, all of the Sitka spruce used in Bedell Guitars is recovered from blown-down, fallen, or dead Sitka logs.

Brazilian Rosewood is recognized as "the Holy Grail of Tonewoods" and is popular in the field of high-end instruments. However, since colonial times, this species has been severely endangered in Brazil's Atlantic Forest due to overharvesting. Today, Brazilian rosewood is only available and can be used for guitars if it was harvested and exported before the CITES restriction in 1992 or if it was harvested from trees that had fallen naturally, and in both situations, it must be accompanied by a certificate of provenance.

Tonewood, from Bedell Guitar official website

The way to fix it

The guitar industry is worth US$1.6 billion per annum globally and is the largest sector of musical instrument manufacturing. Fortunately, people have realized the seriousness of the ecological damage and have begun to take measures. "We don't have a lot of choice in what was planted generations ago," Born underlined at the Fender facility. "But we can certainly do for the future." 

Steve McMinn founded Pacific Rim Tonewoods (PRT), a devoted specialist sawmilling business in Washington State, USA, out of a personal passion for wood and guitars. PRT is the focal point of a series of studies on tree growth for potential application in guitar production. While their primary business is the processing of Sitka spruce for acoustic guitar soundboards, they have also made investments in a number of tree-growing experiments that concentrate particularly on alternative species, including the endemic western big-leaf maple (Acer macrophyllum) and the Hawai'i-grown substitute for rosewood known as koa (Acacia koa). 

Newly planted koa, at Haleakala Ranch, Maui.

Outstanding problems

The production of guitars, however, differs from other businesses, including the paper industry, the furniture industry, and the building industry, which are not dependent on certain species of wood and have been able to adapt to alternatives more readily. We did discover alternatives, but the unfurling dilemma was that alternative timbers rose to high demand, value, and overexploitation. They also were subject to greater regulation after becoming ecologically endangered. Furthermore, the industry was also burdened by rigid customs and customer expectations since it catered to consumers who placed a premium on emotional value and attributes that affirmed their identities.

In general, the legal international acquisition of traditional timbers became increasingly challenging, uneven in quality, and expensive due to material scarcity combined with increased CITES/Lacey Act enforcement. We need to find a way for guitar manufacturing while putting an emphasis on environmental preservation.

References

Acoustic Guitar - Handmade Acoustic Guitars - Mahogany Guitars | Bedell Guitars. ‘Sitka Spruce’. 

[online]Available at <https://bedellguitars.com/seed-to-song/the-tonewood-certification-project/tonewoods/sitka-spruce/> (Accessed 25 October 2022).

Acoustic Guitar - Handmade Acoustic Guitars - Mahogany Guitars | Bedell Guitars. ‘Tonewood’. 

[online]Available at <https://bedellguitars.com/guitars/tonewood/> (Accessed 25 October 2022).

Dave, Hunter. ‘What’s the Big Deal About Brazilian Rosewood? | GuitarPlayer’, 2017.

https://www.guitarplayer.com/gear/whats-the-big-deal-about-brazilian-rosewood.

Gibson, Chris, and Andrew Warren. ‘Keeping Time with Trees: Climate Change, Forest Resources, 

and Experimental Relations with the Future’. Geoforum 108 (2020): 325–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2019.02.017.

Gibson, Chris, and Andrew Warren. ‘Resource-Sensitive Global Production Networks: 

Reconfigured Geographies of Timber and Acoustic Guitar Manufacturing’. Economic Geography 92, no. 4 (1 October 2016): 430–54. https://doi.org/10.1080/00130095.2016.1178569.

The North American Guitar. ‘The Brazilian Rosewood Mystique’.

[online]Available at <https://thenorthamericanguitar.com/blogs/news/the-brazilian-rosewood-mystique> (Accessed 25 October 2022).

Warren, Andrew, and Chris Gibson. ‘Friday Essay: The Guitar Industry’s Hidden Environmental 

Problem — and the People Trying to Fix It’. The Conversation. [online]Available at <http://theconversation.com/friday-essay-the-guitar-industrys-hidden-environmental-problem-and-the-people-trying-to-fix-it-159211> (Accessed 25 October 2022.)