Into The Woods
Experimentation with urban woods is a relatively new initiative among acoustic builders. Rosie Heydenrych tells us about the instruments she builds from alternative timbers
Rosie Heydenrych of Turnstone Guitars in Surrey is a strong advocate for alternative timbers for her acoustic guitars, favouring woods that are indigenous to the UK. Acknowledging that it’s not easy to tear up the rulebook, especially where die-hard traditionalists are concerned, she tells the story of building an acoustic for a customer in the US who is old-school to the point that most of the other guitars in his collection are Sitka spruce and rosewood. But Rosie built him an acoustic from (UK-grown) western red cedar and yew and now, months after delivery, he’s still telling her it’s one of his favourite instruments.
How did your work with alternative timbers first come about?
“It was initially environmental awareness that rosewoods were depleting. I knew that a lot of the people who are established are solely using things like rosewoods because that’s what they built their reputations on, so that’s what people expect them to build. I can understand how that’s come about and why they have to keep doing that. But somebody like me, who hadn’t established a reputation, could have the opportunity to experiment a bit more. If you make a dud guitar right at the start, you put that down to experience, whereas further down the line you start to get a little more expensive, you’re taking a bit more of a gamble.
“I was aware that resources were depleting, but also becoming aware of a lot of English woods that could potentially be used for different components of a guitar. I knew there were certain woods that had been used where the results were a little easier to anticipate and I started with those woods. From there I started to get a bit more experimental, using woods that weren’t generally used and taking an educated guess. Soundboards generally need to have high tensile strength and so you think, ‘Okay, which woods in other species have those characteristics?’ Necks obviously
need to be very stable and relatively light, and so I began applying those physical properties to alternative woods and started to feel my way through the options.”
Is going ahead with a build the only real way of testing a new wood?
“From a tonal perspective it is; you basically have to build it to see how it turns out. But with regard to the structural aspects of the wood, obviously the acoustic guitar in particular is under a huge amount of tension for the size and thickness of some of the pieces of wood that you’re using. So you have to take everything into account, as far as the bracing and the other woods you are using as structural support.
“Even in the alternative-wood department, the more widely used woods gave me a basis to start with where I knew they were fit for purpose – something like English walnut had been used a fair bit – and what you start to understand is the properties of alternative woods can correlate quite closely to the more traditional woods. For example, London plane and sycamore can correlate quite closely to something like maple, so you know you’re in the right ballpark. Obviously, what you do with that wood opens a whole new can of worms.”
Which woods have you settled upon to include in your instruments?
“Some examples that I have personal experience of is Fenland black oak, aka bog oak. Density-wise, it correlates fairly closely to ebony and I would also say it has that same contribution to the overall colouration of the tone of the guitar Another is English cherry, which is tonally like a sweeter mahogany – it’s actually a little bit lighter than mahogany but has the same structural properties. It’s fairly light and stable so it can be used for back and sides, but it can also be used for necks because you can get it with really nice straight grain.
“Relating to the stuff that Taylor’s doing, I’ve used ash on necks a fair bit and I hadn’t considered using it using it on back and sides just because I’ve been using other stuff. I could probably go on forever about all the different types of wood that aren’t so widely used.”
Have you experienced any surprises – good or bad – in your experiments?
“One of the back and sides that I’ve used is English yew, which is fairly light but you get told that you want a heavy back and sides to colour the tone. It was fairly early on in my career and I thought, ‘I’m going to use a western red cedar English-grown top, which I’d used a number of times, but on the back I want to use another English wood that I’m interested in.’ And it just so happened that I was at a supplier and he had some really beautiful back and side yew sets, so I decided to use it and it built into a beautiful instrument.”
“You start to understand how the properties of alternative woods correlate to more traditional woods” Rosie Heydenrych