Classical Guitar

The classical guitar is an acoustic instrument generally constituted of six strings, three treble strings of nylon and three lower strings wounded with metal. Sometimes, the classical guitar is also called Spanish guitar due to its origin. It is part of a musical family called family of chordophones, and its main characteristic is having nylon strings instead of steel strings. The classical guitar has evolved a lot in the past four centuries. It was deeply influenced by Renaissance guitars (also called gittern in English, and resembled a small lute although it was carved from one single piece of wood) and Baroque guitars (which had normally five pairs of strings).

A classical guitar player, or classical guitarist, such as Steve Krenz from Learn and Master Guitar, can play polyphonic music because two, three, or four musical lines or voices can be sustained due to the bigger space between the strings which make the fingerboard slightly wider. This instrument is played using the fingers of one hand to pluck the strings (the thumb goes from the top string downwards and the other fingers go from the bottom string upwards), and the fingers of the other hand press the strings in the fingerboard, making changes to the vibrating length of a string. The classical guitar has evolved mainly from three sources: the vihuela (an instrument developed by the Spanish which looked like a guitar and had six double strings made of gut), the lute, and the Renaissance 5-string guitar. It is known that many instruments similar to the guitar have been quite popular for at least 5,000 years. An example of an ancient instrument similar to the guitar is the cithara, which was invented in India.

In the Middle Ages, there were 3, 4, and 5-string guitars, such as the "Guitarra Latina" and the "Guitarra Morisca". During this period, the most commonly used notation was the tablature, very famous among composers. In the 17th century, Italy was the centre of the guitar world, and late in the 18th century, the Spanish style started to flourish. Important composers of the 18th century who wrote originally for guitars are Fernando Sor (Spanish, 1778) and Mauro Giuliani (Italian, 1781), both influenced by the Viennese classicism.

However, it was in the 19th century that the guitar became a widely known instrument. The most famous composers of this century were Francisco Tárrega (Spanish, 1852), and Angel Barrios (Spain, 1882-1964), among others. The classical guitar is a very versatile instrument because music written for other instruments such as vihuela, lute, Renaissance guitar, Baroque guitar, harpsichord, and even piano (pieces written by Albeniz, Granados, and especially by J. S. Bach were largely transcribed) can be adapted to be played by a classical guitar.

In the 20th century, it has become a very popular instrument. Among its most famous artists were Andrés Segovia, Augustin Barrios Mangore, and Heitor Villa-Lobos. Also, it had several variations introduced such as the multi-string classical guitar, the classical guitar with more than six strings (generally having between seven to ten strings), and the classical electric guitar, which was introduced in the market by Gibson in 1982. This last variation was made famous by pop music stars like the Gypsy Kings.