There is a post on the Acoustic Guitar Forum serving as a buyer's guide for classical guitars. The original question is posed by an experienced acoustic guitar player who suddenly was compelled by a classical guitar in the store recently. The store in question happened to have Taylor Classical Guitars and thus begins the thread:

Question:"I have never played a Taylor classical which is really what this thread is about. Do Taylor nylon strung guitars match up to Spanish made ones? Are they value for money or are you paying for the name?"

Answers:

On Taylors:

"The short answer is, no, Taylor nylon string guitars are not much like a Spanish classical guitar. They are heavier built and sound like a nylon string guitar vs a classical guitar. They have a narrower fingerboard than traditional classical guitars. This is a good thing for some players and not so good for others. It may be good for you if you are used to playing steel string guitars."

On Classical Guitars in General:

"I bought a classical guitar about 4 years ago. I tried out pretty much every classical guitar (up to about $3500 - I did not consider the more expensive small builder classicals) in a quality shop that has a lot more classicals than most places do.

I carefully tried out Bernabe, Loriente, and some others. I ended up with a Burguet, which was about a third the price of many of the others, and really seemed to me to be the best of the bunch regardless of price. I tried out about 7 of these Burguets and they varied quite a bit. There were some that did not impress me, and others that were good, but there were two that stood out, and I went with what I thought was the best of these two. It is a great guitar that I have played a LOT. Wonderful tone, good volume, very responsive. And it was not expensive, as these things go. I have recently heard though that they have tripled in price since I got mine.

If you are not wanting to go into those sorts of price ranges, there are a variety of decent less expensive classicals that can be found in a GOOD guitar store (most guitar shops I have been in have pretty poor selections of classicals). A brand that stands out in my mind is LaPatrie, made by the same folks who make Seagulls. Like the Seagulls, these are much nicer guitars than their very reasonable prices would suggest. They don't sing quite like my Burguet, but they are darn nice instruments that are set up well, play well, and sound good, especially considering the price.

I have read on the Web (and everything on the Web is true, right?) that unless you are going to go with a very expensive classical, you will probably get a better classical guitar if you go with a cedar top than if you buy a moderately priced spruce top classical. This web site suggested though that in the more expensive classicals, some of the spruce top classicals are the best. I don't know how valid this is, but I do know that in the price range I was looking at the cedar top classicals were indeed sounding better to me than the spruce top ones. Or maybe this cedar vs. spruce thing is a bunch of baloney. I don't know.

The cedar vs spruce decision probably mostly comes down to what sound you want. In general, I don't think it would be correct to say that one is better. They are just different."

View the full thread to read all of the responses

Check out this recent interview with guitarist Robin Trower. I've included a few of my favorite excerpts below. Also take a look at our Robin Trower style lessons.

“Albert King is my all-time favorite guitar player,” Trower said. “I listen to a lot his stuff in the car and Howlin’ Wolf is the other guy that I still (listen to) alot.

“Albert King’s playing and Howlin’ Wolf’s music and singing still have a great effect on me. As far as rock and roll goes, Pete Townshend is a giant to me. (Townshend) plays guitar to support the song, and I think he and I have that in common.”

Trower said he also listens to alot of popular music from the 1930s and 1940s.

“I quite like the music of Dinah Washington and Al Bowlly,” Trower said. “I really like early American and British popular music.”

If you haven't check out iTunesU yet, they have a lot of cool free podcasts of lectures up. One of the coolest being a history of jazz podcast. The lectures are by Dr. Gordon Vernick who is an Associate Professor of Music at Georgia State University in Atlanta. "Each segment is intended to shed light on important individual creating jazz musicians and specific movements/genres within jazz canon. They are intended for jazz lovers and those that are merely interested in this important American musical art form."

Each episode was originally broadcast on 1690AM in Atlanta. If you happen to live in the Atlanta area, that is possibly the greatest radio station I've ever heard. It sounds like someone with the best record collection in history is just randomly playing songs that they like. Everything from 1950's R&B to Elvis Costello. When I'm listening to it, I use Shazam at least once an hour.