Hermann Hauser Sr.

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Hermann Hauser Sr. (1882-1952) was one of the greatest classical guitar luthiers of the 20th century.

[edit] Biography

Hermann Hauser Sr. is perhaps best remembered for the remarkable instruments he built in the Spanish tradition after 1924. In that year, both Andrés Segovia and Miguel Llobet visited Hauser. Segovia had attended a concert in Munich at which a group of musicians all played Hauser's. Segovia was impressed by the quality of Hauser's work and wrote his impressions of the concert, noting that he "immediately saw the potential of this great artisan if only his mastery might be turned to the construction of the guitar in the Spanish pattern as immutably fixed by Torres and Ramirez" (Segovia 1954). Segovia encouraged Hauser to copy his 1912 Manuel Ramirez guitar (an instrument generally believed to have been built by Santos Hernandez while he was foreman of the Ramirez shop). He examined and made measurements of this instrument. As Llobet owned an 1859 Antonio Torres, Hauser also had opportunity to examine it as well. Although Hauser began building in the Spanish tradition in 1925, the secrets of these great masters were not an open book, and it took Hauser twelve years of trial and error before he was able to build a guitar that Segovia proclaimed as being the "greatest guitar of our epoch."

While the story of Hauser's conversion to the Spanish tradition as it is usually told places the emphasis on what he learned from these great Spanish luthiers, little attention has been paid to what Hauser himself may have contributed to that tradition. Whatever Hermann Hauser brought to the Spanish tradition was rooted in the German tradition. Hauser was himself the son of a luthier, Josef Hauser (1854-1939), and attended the State School for Violin Making in Mittenwald as a youth. To become a luthier, one had to pass a state exam which covered all aspects of the luthier's art, and Hauser's examination master was Johann Otto Haslvanter, a famous guitar and zither maker in Munich. While Hermann started his career by building zithers by 1905 he was also making guitars. Following his graduation, Hauser went to work in the Amberer's shop, a family of luthiers who had been building for several generations. However, by the time of Segovia's and Llobet's visit Hauser had established his own shop, and had developed an excellent reputation for his precise work building guitars, lutes, lyre-guitars, and historical instruments. While justifiably Hauser's reputation rests on some 250 instruments that he built between 1925 and 1952, he had by 1924 perhaps already made 250 guitars in the German tradition.

Just like Antonio Torres Jurado, Hermann Hauser I has influenced many 20th century luthiers. It goes without saying that his guitars have been played and are being played by many virtuosi and stars. In the Hauser family guest book you can find out about the intensive relations between luthier Hermann Hauser I and a variety of guitarists. These relations are reflected in the specific labeling of Hauser guitars, such as Llobet model, Segovia model and Bream model.

The Hermann Hauser I guitar which was played by Andrés Segovia between 1937 and 1970, can be viewed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York now.