Guitar
This instrument although reminiscent of the elegant and ancient cittern was designed to facilitate the repertoire of the increasingly popular six-string guitar. The Fabricatore family manufactured visually desirable instruments and kept at the forefront of musical innovation. As the lyre-guitar is merely a guitar in lyre form, so this instrument is a guitar in cittern form.
Gennaro Fabricatore and his family were involved both in mass-production and also of small scale manufacture. The smaller label used on this instrument indicates that this guitar was made by Gennaro Fabricatore himself. (Daniel Wheeldon 5/3/16)
Technical description: Six-string guitar. Two-piece pine top with ebony wbwbwbwbwb binding; sound hole diameter 66.25 mm with matching binding, rosewood bridge (either altered or replaced); one-piece maple back with ebony binding; neck with ebony veneer (with rosewood patches); rosewood veneered fingerboard with 15 brass frets (numbers 10 and 15 missing); headstock (not original) with ebonized veneer and six worm and gear tuners (not original). (Daniel Wheeldon 5/3/16)
Gennaro Fabricatore and his family were involved both in mass-production and also of small scale manufacture. The smaller label used on this instrument indicates that this guitar was made by Gennaro Fabricatore himself. (Daniel Wheeldon 5/3/16)
Technical description: Six-string guitar. Two-piece pine top with ebony wbwbwbwbwb binding; sound hole diameter 66.25 mm with matching binding, rosewood bridge (either altered or replaced); one-piece maple back with ebony binding; neck with ebony veneer (with rosewood patches); rosewood veneered fingerboard with 15 brass frets (numbers 10 and 15 missing); headstock (not original) with ebonized veneer and six worm and gear tuners (not original). (Daniel Wheeldon 5/3/16)
Artwork Details
- Title: Guitar
- Maker: Gennaro Fabricatore (Italian, Naples ca. 1750–1832 Naples)
- Date: 1802
- Geography: Naples, Italy
- Culture: Italian
- Medium: Spruce, beechwood?, ebony
- Dimensions: 61.5cm x 26cm x 10cm
- Classification: Chordophone-Lute-plucked-fretted
- Credit Line: The Crosby Brown Collection of Musical Instruments, 1889
- Object Number: 89.4.983
- Curatorial Department: Musical Instruments
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Gennaro Fabricatore
1808
Gennaro Fabricatore
1807
Giosue Esposito
1881
Johann Anton Stauffer
ca. 1835–40
Jean Baptiste Vuillaume
mid-19th century
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