William Cumpiano's
String Instrument
Newsletter #6

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Science, Art and Guitar Proselytizing

© William R. Cumpiano 1998, All Rights Reserved

Florida State University biochemist Dr. Michael Kasha created a stir in the guitar field twenty-five years ago when he proposed a systems-analysis approach to the resolution of the age old dilemma of structure vs. tone in the guitar.

The traditional standards for classical guitarmaking were laid down for subsequent generations of makers and players alike to follow by the venerated nineteenth-century Spanish luthier Antonio de Torres (he died about the time of the American Civil War). Torres assembled into his new design what he considered the best of all the various ideas that were being used in Europe during his time. The sum of his chosen scale length, soundbox size, bracing pattern (which consisted of a series of long struts under the bridge) and even his decoration scheme became the "classic" guitar which we see today all over the world.

Kasha's system, derived during the early seventies, in a nutshell, proposed that under the traditional system, the length of traditional stiffening bars under the top unduly restricted the soundboard's movements. Instead, he proposed a multiplicity of no less than twenty short braces fanning out in what appeared to be a peculiar, yet seemingly purposeful pattern around the bridge. Second he proposed an aluminum stiffener imbedded into the heel to keep the body and neck more integral and less flexible relative to each other. He also proposed an assymetrically-shaped bridge which purportedly coupled the bass and treble components of the string's signal more efficiently to the guitar. Unfortunately the rounded, triangular Kasha bridge, which became the most visible and distinctive feature of the system, gave the guitar's face the appearance of a rather comical haughty sneer.

As a scientist, Dr. Kasha sought the approval of other scientists and proposed the system before an august assembly of physicists and acoustical engineers during at least one convention of the Acoustical Society of America. Ordinarily, musical instrument acoustics is given faint attention at these gatherings: the preponderance of the interest goes to papers treating submarine sonar ranging systems and nuclear-explosion detection devices for the Defense Department. So, even within the faint attention afforded to instrument acousticians, Kasha's paper was pretty much ignored, for what was explained to me then as it's bad science: unsubstantiated claims, no supporting data, and the killer: even though a celebrated a biochemist, Kasha was not one of the boys.

So he enlisted the support and interest of the late Richard Schneider, the Kalamazoo, MI guitarmaking genius who became the main proselyte of the Kasha system and a fountainhead for a small group of young luthiers and concertizing guitarists that got on board in an attempt to promote and popularize the system. Maddeningly, they were all damned with faint praise, and even treated over the years as if they were a silly religious cult by traditionalists.

Several of the later samples that Schneider built utilizing Kasha's system reportedly were, indeed, impressive sonically--but not extraordinarily so. Even this limited success was attributed not to Kasha, but to Schnieder's personal skill and intuition which, it was believed, could extract excellent results from whichever scheme he might set his mind to. Alas, the proponents of the system claimed a sea-change of improvement which would justify the bewildering complexity of the new system. Listeners and builders simply were not sufficiently impressed to change their ways. Hence, the faint praise. Seemingly, this just stiffened the Kasha clan's resolve: they were determined to pursue the system, hoping to refine it until it fulfilled the promise that they eventually expected from it.

Fifteen years later, very little interest remains in the Kasha approach, not that a great deal of interest was ever elicited from the general musician/guitarmaking public. The Kasha system is simply not a subject of discussion or interest in the field any more. Apart from them merits of the system, one of the major factors that contributed to the decline in visibility of the system was the fact that in his later years, up to his death, Richard Schneider stopped using the system. So the main driving force behind the system's general acceptance pretty much died with him. The coterie of younger builders that worked with Richard have gone on to devise personal variations of their system, or just adopted one or two features of the entire system and returned to more traditional forms for the rest of their instruments.

At the height of its interest during the mid-70s, Richard Schneider was an indefatigable proponent of the system and a persistent advocate. He came up to me after showing me a Kasha guitar he called "Wanda" (I kid you not), I played it and simply could not hear it in the large room. I greatly admired Richard on a personal level, so I felt compelled to say something positive...so I praised it's stunning workmanship. Visibly irritated, he nonetheless glared earnestly at me and said: "You're looking at the future!" and turning on his heels, walked off with it.

It was this manic energy that drove some to call his interest obsessive and overbearing. He reportedly dogged this century's greatest grand master of the guitar, Andrés Segovia, to get him to evaluate a Kasha-system guitar. The old man--who rejected modernity in all its forms--resisted his annoying entreaties, but finally consented to try it, just to appease the persistent guitarmaker. Segovia played it and immediately rejected the guitar out of hand. The rejection just increased Schneider's conviction and, convinced that Segovia's eventual approval would certainly open the doors to the system's universal acceptance, kept after the old man with purportedly improved versions of the instrument over the next several years. Segovia finally accepted to own a copy. It's unclear whether this was because he liked it or simply because he wanted to put an end to the matter. Nevertheless Segovia, up to the date of his death, I believe, never performed with it in public. Yet Schneider and his followers believed that they had nonetheless won a major victory.

At the same time, this victory was counterbalanced by an embarrassing setback: the result of a botched effort to bring the system to the mass market. On the weight of his own considerable reputation, Schneider was able to persuade one of the oldest and largest guitar-making factories in the world, the Gibson Company, to build and market a Kasha-braced instrument. Schneider blamed the ensuing fiasco on Gibson marketing executives who insisted the system be inaugurated to the mass public on a line of steel-string folk guitars, rather than on low-tension nylon-strung classic guitars, which was what Kasha had intended. Regardless of what Schneider later called (in conversations with me) the impulsive and premature decision to misapply the system, Schneider indeed participated closely in the design, tooling, production and marketing of the Gibson Mark steel-string guitar. The process was vastly more complex and difficult than the production of ordinary guitars. The result was a utter, certifiable and expensive flop. The Gibson Mark guitar was heavy, ugly and an utter failure sonically. It also suffered from the worse aspects of mass-produced guitars: bad glue-ups, poor materials selection, indifferent workmanship, bad action adjustments...in short, a complete fiasco. Subsequently, Richard tried valiantly to put the whole matter behind him.

Kasha's legacy remains as simply an early and earnest attempt to redesign the acoustic guitar, in a laudable effort to bring science and art together. Unlike the violin, which has a far simpler anatomy,the guitar's complexity defies analysis. I believe that Kasha's attempt to analyze and bend it to his will and Schneider's effort to promote it, was self-delusional. It was a failure in many ways, but most notably the hide-bound nature of the classic-guitar field at that point in time and the peculiar appearance of the instruments. The Kasha system still resonates occasionally when guitar lovers who simply do not know the particulars of its history and the personalities involved, are today intrigued when they hear about it for the first time, or when they see the peculiar "face" of a Kasha-inspired guitar.

That is not to say that the guitar's traditional acoustical anatomy cannot be improved. There are today a small number of builders who are, as we speak, stunningly and dramatically wringing sea-change improvements in the guitar's acoustic anatomy. Alan Chapman and Greg Smallman are two builders whose work I'm familiar with who are achieving magnificent results with graphite-reinforced lattice-bracing systems and beefed up soundbox structures which are consistently producing classic guitars which can more aptly be termed "cannons." And they are not knocking on doors and buttonholing people at conventions trying to elicit positive response from people trying avoid them. The best and brightest guitarists are starting to flock to this new breed of builders, and more and more makers are starting to emulate their success. No proselytizing has been necesary."