In the late 1960s guitar makers began to see restrictions on the importation of Brazilian rosewood in The United States, Europe and Asia. This was the preferred wood for the backs and sides of both classical guitars and steel strings.

Over the years since, luthiers still search this wood out; a few luthier suppliers still provide it at an extreme cost. Now Brazilian stump wood is culled, veneers are recovered from furniture and old private stocks of quarter-sawn wood come from luthiers and wood workers are discovered. The end result is sky-high prices so professional musicians can't even afford a guitar made from this wood and the best Brazilian endowed instruments go to Dr. Collector.

To see how this became an issue it is instructive to see Brazil as a country of great resources and a history of selling off its resources at bargain prices. Brazil stands as the foremost example of the convergence of many problems that face the developing world. With great wealth in resources, both material and human, Brazil is a beacon of alarm and hope. Encapsulated in this example is the crux of the problems of wood acquisition, the availability and consequence if acquired. If the people of a developing country have been denied their country's wealth, if World Bank loans with austere payback measures deny a country's investment into the people, an imbalance will occur that can be catastrophic and wood is sold off irresponsibly. This affects the guitar market, and a focused view into a looming environmental catastrophe, possibly based on the misunderstanding of fertility of the soil, and the basic political/economic quandary of Brazil cannot hurt the guitar aficionado to know and we can buy responsibly. Also the interconnectivity of the socioeconomic, the ecologic predispositions of the soil, when wood is taken for whatever reason, to use the wood or to remove it for cattle grazing, has tremendous effect on the whole planet.

The great nineteenth-century naturalist Thomas Belt said of the Amazon, " ... a ceaseless round of ever-active life weaves the forest scenery of the tropics into one monotonous whole." The Amazon soil's fertility is a misconception to those blinded by the overpowering life that is green, but the soil is not fit for anything in the way of agriculture. The great density of growth masks an impoverished soil. The great heat and rainfall have eroded its surface; minerals and nutrients have been washed out exacerbated by heavy rainfall that hits hard and loosens the surface.

The canopy holds most of the nutrients that when vegetations falls it's quickly transferred into carbon and nitrogen, then the hyper efficient root system of the trees absorb it.

When wood is taken the ground is exposed for too long to the sun it becomes red brick as the nutrients are decomposed and it becomes fit for nothing. This creates a very thin edge of usability, fit for only slash and burn growing.

Historically, there has been little debate about the population along the Amazon. There is a fairly accepted conclusion that there was never any large-scale agriculture and populations densities over one thousand. When the great explorer Alexander von Humboldt came to the confluence of the Rio Negro and the Amazon in 1803, he found the settlement of Manaus, which from the new rubber trade this village had transformed. Until then nothing more than Yanomamo type villages with slash and burn revolving plot growing existed. There is no kind of soil that works for large-scale food production, so wood acquisition doesn't aid in making soil ready for planting without massive effort.

Betty J. Meggers, the Smithsonian archaeologist in the 50s and 60s, in her 1971 book, Amazonia: Man and Culture in a Counterfeit Paradise, says that slash and burn is, " a superb response to ecological limits." There are a few harvests, the soil is not exposed to the sun too long, and switching from field to field food is grown and the forest survives. There is not enough food to support complex societies but usable for small and specialized villages.

In her study of Marajo, an island larger than New Jersey that sits at the mouth of the Amazon, Meggers points out that there was a sophisticated society, from about 800 to 1400 A.D., but the earliest pottery was its most skillful and ornate. The quality of the pottery soon declines as centuries progress as it became harder and harder to make a living, thus fostering a steady decline in this society.

The misguided viability of settling the Amazon was mostly created in 1964 by a military coup and a drunken borrowing from developed nations. In the early 1970s, subsidized rubber plantations were ousted in favor of selling cheap land for raising cattle, and Brazil, being the poorest of nations, sells to those with money, and as alleviation to poverty, it works negatively when Indians were displaced into the cities like Rio de Janeiro.

The large debt exists in Brazil as a cancer, paid for twice but drowning in interest, this country of enormous resources could not move forward and invest in the people. Duplicated from Africa to India, and throughout the developing world, debt is a sure device used by wealthy nations to keep nations below the equator supplying the above the equator nations with raw material wealth. And often times, as in Brazil, the debt is incurred by military despots that have garnered the favor of developed countries by selling off the natural resources at bargain prices for money said to be for development.

But the Amazon is our pet environmental dog. We feed it a diet of limited vision and iconographic idolatry, worshiping it as all of ours. The lungs of the world it is called to further exacerbate a blind eye to the sheer economic scope of the problem, and environmentalists fight for the Amazon as if it existed outside of any relation to the people of Brazil.

The Amazon must be Brazil's to use wisely, but don't look to The United States for and example of judicious land use. As an example, developed countries, The United States included, have long ago used up their forests, so a Brazilian may ask us to plow under our modern art museums and NASCAR tracks to make them green with trees so Brazilians can breathe. Neither is North American the lungs of the world, and we have no right to ask Brazil to be our lung machine.

Brazil may have the right to ask for forgiveness on illegally incurred debt, and debt relief is about the only way that undeveloped countries can alleviate poverty given austere payback measures concocted by the various nations of developed the world. Brazil now seems to be becoming an economic powerhouse no thanks to the incredible debt it has incurred. To save the Amazon is to start with the people of Brazil and help them by absolving some of this debt. Then they will use their own power to redirect their resources inward, and we will still get our piece of it.

Judicious Land Use?
A good example of injudicious land use can be best found in developed nations. Particularly telling is the settling of the American West, the diverting of large river systems and diminishing aquifers.

The diversion of water to Southern California, a desert basically, with only enough ground water to support 1% of the present population, the large tracts of farmland in the Imperial Valley, again basically a desert, should illustrate injudicious land use, but Southern California is an artificial paradise that goes in and out of water shortages. Free water is not forever.

As if free water was ever a concept when plowing the west's agricultural power. There was a saying among those who wanted to settle the west, "apply the plow and then it will rain." But the rain never came, and groundwater, that becomes contaminated by agricultural runoff, and not replenishing more than a ¼ the rate used has been the success of agriculture west of the Mississippi.

Arizona has had more than a nine-year drought, and Phoenix looks like the most ill placed city in the Universe. So what do we, as judicious developers, have to tell Brazil? Maybe we could say, "it ain't over until the fat lady sings," but she ain't singing the song of rain right now, and from Texas to California--New Mexico to Idaho, artificiality exists on the knife edge of water delivery.

Ancient history informs us about injudicious land use. The Maya we have a tendency to disregard because we are highly technological societies who, with the flip of a switch, draw water from hundreds of feet into the ground. This was something the Maya were unable to do, and in the Yucatan Peninsula, which is mostly limestone, precipitation is three to five feet per year, but it sinks into the limestone that was well beyond the reach of Mayan technology. It is estimated that this was the cause of their demise.

Brazilian Rosewood, Tone Woods and CITES
Embodied, in the body of the guitar, is a bipolar global situation. The tops of the guitars typically use softwoods from northern climes, above the equatorial lowland forests of hardwoods, places with tortured cold wind-high altitude mountains of North America and Europe.

Sitka and Engelmann spruce, from Canada and Alaska, Adirondack spruce, western red cedar and eastern cedar, both from Canada and The United States, Alpine spruce from Switzerland and France, German and Italian spruce, are not meaningful in sound without being coupled with the hardwoods from, especially the Amazon and forests around the world below the equator.

In the late 1960s The United States and some European countries placed an embargo on Brazilian Rosewood. By its species name dalbergia nigra, the wood has inclusions of crystallized minerals and resin filled canals that give it an extraordinary look. The wood was the primary tone wood for the backs and sides of guitars, and used as a laminate and in a solid form for very expensive furniture and musical instruments including pianos.

In furniture making Brazilian rosewood had its heyday in the 19th and early 20th century, but in the 20th century, it became the premiere wood for guitar backs and sides. In the early 20th century, plentiful and cheap, many of the most highly touted instruments were made of it. It became a tradition, and instruments made from lesser woods commanded lesser prices and profit margins for luthiers.

In the late 60s a Martin D-28, which is made from solid Brazilian rosewood back and sides, an Engelmann spruce soundboard, and a neck made of Brazilian mahogany, with an African ebony fretboard, was priced from $600 to $800. Now that same guitar would be priced at $12,000 if the Brazilian rosewood was available, and most of the time it is not. Martin's use of Brazilian rosewood is only special order.

It has gotten to the point that this wood is so highly touted that wood suppliers are buying the stump wood of dalbergia nigra. Still bringing a price anywhere from $350 to $2000 a set, the cost of the wood is passed on to the end consumer, usually a collector of guitars, as a professional musician cannot afford a $12,000 price tag.

Some wood dealers in The United States, particularly Luthier Merchantile International, LMI, materials supplier throughout the world, will not deal with endangered species, but amongst most of the supply chain this is self-policing situation, and less than green dealers trade illegal woods.

Brazilian clearing, their low economic condition and poverty fostered a glut of Brazilian Rosewood and decimated forests along with cattle grazing room's need for clear land. We had been happy to consume this wood up to a certain point.

Concerns of the decimation of forests might enter into the mind of a green luthier, but that is superceded by the availability of woods from international wood suppliers such as LMI. As said LMI does not deal in Brazilian Rosewood anymore, but is having a time being correct with other endangered woods and I have seen Madagascar rosewood gone from their site. If a luthier so desires an illegal wood, it can be found in a poorly enforced industry.

Further investigating Madagascar rosewood, dalbergia baroni, I came upon the Madinter website. A wood dealer from Spain, I've seen in the past several years the removal of Brazilian rosewood from their company's website, and now see the explanation of small log size concerning the Madagascar, and the fact that these guitar back are cut flat and not quarter sawn, the sides, being of smaller width are quarter sawn. The small size of logs may soon yield three-piece backs.

LMI is well known for its environmentally taken sound woods. When a wood becomes endangered there is a small icon that contains an elephant with a log in its trunk with the words "we no longer carry this item." Woods that feature this icon at LMI's site are: Amazon rosewood, Canadian cypress/Alaskan yellow cedar, American cherry (Also a Martin Smartwood back and sides), curly Spanish cedar, European pear, Jarrah, Madagascar rosewood, quilted mahogany, and pau rosa. This statement accompanies these woods: Luthiers Mercantile International is proud to have recently obtained our Forest Stewardship Council certification, and we are now providing Certified materials which were obtained through the FSC chain-of-custody. FSC standards "ensure that forestry is practiced in an (1) environmentally responsible, (2) socially beneficial and (3) economically viable way."

The first item in the statement is obvious, the second item, as explained by Chris Herrod, sales manager of LMI, is concerning world states that are in turmoil, politically unstable and thus leading to questionable harvesting practices of woods that may or may not be endangered. Possibly the root causes of these instabilities are the very practices of globalization and austere World Bank loan payback measures that foster instability through the lack of investment into the people of that state.

CITES, or the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, is an international agreement between governments to ensure that trade between nations do not endanger the very existence of the cited plants and animals.

One may recall the ban on ivory obtained from elephants. The demand for ivory led to the wholesale slaughter of elephants in Africa and India. Below is from the CITES website and pertains to the foundation of this international organization:

Widespread information nowadays about the endangered status of many prominent species, such as the tiger and elephants, might make the need for such a convention seem obvious. But at the time when the ideas for CITES were first formed, in the 1960s, international discussion of the regulation of wildlife trade for conservation purposes was something relatively new. With hindsight, the need for CITES is clear. Annually, international wildlife trade is estimated to be worth billions of dollars and to include hundreds of millions of plant and animal specimens. The trade is diverse, ranging from live animals and plants to a vast array of wildlife products derived from them, including food products, exotic leather goods, wooden musical instruments, timber, tourist curios and medicines. Levels of exploitation of some animal and plant species are high and the trade in them, together with other factors, such as habitat loss, is capable of heavily depleting their populations and even bringing some species close to extinction. Many wildlife species in trade are not endangered, but the existence of an agreement to ensure the sustainability of the trade is important in order to safeguard these resources for the future.

Because the trade in wild animals and plants crosses borders between countries, the effort to regulate it requires international cooperation to safeguard certain species from over-exploitation. CITES was conceived in the spirit of such cooperation. Today, it accords varying degrees of protection to more than 30,000 species of animals and plants, whether they are traded as live specimens, fur coats or dried herbs.

CITES was drafted as a result of a resolution adopted in 1963 at a meeting of members of IUCN (The World Conservation Union). The text of the Convention was finally agreed at a meeting of representatives of 80 countries in Washington DC., United States of America, on 3 March 1973, , and on 1 July 1975 CITES entered in force. The original of the Convention was deposited with the Depositary Government in the Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish languages, each version being equally authentic.

CITES is an international agreement to which States (countries) adhere voluntarily. States that have agreed to be bound by the Convention ('joined' CITES) are known as Parties. Although CITES is legally binding on the Parties - in other words they have to implement the Convention - it does not take the place of national laws. Rather it provides a framework to be respected by each Party, which has to adopt its own domestic legislation to ensure that CITES is implemented at the national level.

For many years CITES has been among the conservation agreements with the largest membership, with now 171 Parties.

Luthiers have a saying that paves the way for the injudicious use of replacement woods; "there is Indian rosewood and everything else." This implies that Indian rosewood, grown in India and through some South Asian countries, is very specific in sound and Brazilian rosewood and other similar rosewoods such as Bolivian, Amazon, Peruvian, Madagascar, two dozen African and Asian rosewoods are similar in sound, and some in appearance to the prized Brazilian rosewood. So with this in mind, wood dealers march on to find the next Brazilian rosewood in some other country since luthiery demands that a certain sound must be achieved through harder woods and rosewood, other than Indian, fill the bill.

As a past dealer, I traded in guitars made in Paracho, Michoacan, Mexico, and saw with my own eyes the illegal harvesting of palo escrito or Mexican rosewood. I've seen, on truck beds, unprocessed logs, sticky with sap and smelling peppery. The whole town of Paracho smells peppery and like roasted corn.

Mexico, having strict laws about the harvesting of wood, does not enforce these laws. I was assured that the woods of the guitars I purchased for resale were made from legally harvested palo escrito. The truth of these assertions, from multiple luthiers on multiple guitars, was likely untrue as anything to please the customer is said to make a sale.

From 2000 to 2003 I traded in instruments made in the town of Paracho, a town of luthiers who have been making stringed instruments for around 350 years. This small town, not much bigger than a village, has up to 500 individuals hand making guitars. Paracho is undoubtedly the guitar making capital of the Western Hemisphere, if you discount manufacturers that use machines in The United States. Guitars in Paracho are made the same way they were made one hundred years ago.

Towards the end my dealings with Paracho, I began to see the rarity of highly figured palo escrito, the most figured looks somewhat like Brazilian rosewood, some so highly figured that it appears like golden spit curls from a flapper's hairdo. Soon introduced was unseasoned green wood that is cut and quickly dried, and no doubt felled in the dead of night and what I had seen on the flat beds of trucks.

With the CITES prohibition in the 1960s, of Brazilian rosewood The Martin Guitar Company used their stocks of Brazilian rosewood judiciously, introducing the D-35. Similar to the D-28, which the d stands for dreadnought, the D-35 is a full sized acoustic steel stringed guitar suited for great volume and projection. The D-35 had a three piece back, with a center strip and the outer edges of Brazilian rosewood. The D-28 was made of solid quarter-sawn Brazilian rosewood.

Purists rejected this guitar, introduced in the middle 1970s, didn't consider the endangered nature of dalbergia nigra, and probably fostered illegal or questionable harvesting of this wood as demand increased. Today the wood is still available at a premium, but the guitar collector makes no distinction between legal and illegally procured woods although it can be legal with a CITES declaration from the supplier.

Guitar Collectors as the poster children of the consumer society
I have sold guitars for around twenty years. The basic guitar I deal, one with Indian rosewood back and sides, Englemann spruce, mahogany necks and ebony fretboards, see no prohibitions and are easily available. On occasion I get exotic wood guitars, and see that they sell more quickly as it is known that these exotics are getting rare. It would seem that the profit margin for the builder is greater than the dealer as prices to me become almost cost prohibitive.

As well, with the shrinking dollar against the Euro, guitars from Europe have become particularly expensive, especially those made with exotic woods. If I can get them they still go quickly. There seems to be a psychology that forces a person of means to get theirs before there are no more.

I am not responsible, the guitar was already made, and better me than someone else who cannot appreciate it like I, a collector may say to justify the purchase of a guitar made of endangered woods. It is like my justification for eating meat to my vegetarian stepson. Surely a professional guitarist will appreciate an exotic more, and instruments are meant to be used. Dr. Collector just collects and plays quite poorly. He needs guitar lessons, but it would ruin his self-image because he's a poser.

I'm pimping the guitars. The fact is that the most expensive guitars I sell are to doctors, lawyers and professional men, and surely this is not what a matchmaker does? When I had a guitar shop, on the way to Yosemite, I came to realize that men buy guitars on vacations while their wives buy clothing. I have been asked to ship a guitar, as a man will do the purchase without the wife's knowledge. I feel all dirty inside that I pimped a beautiful concert instrument to a monkey of a guitarist.

The operative action is to get theirs before there are no more. It is quite well known that demand fosters supplies, and guitar collectors are nerds, well informed as to what they are buying, what the status of the maker is, the woods and materials; they know the legality, availability, endangerment, and overall monetary value, and I am selling a pretty young girl to a lecherous old man (41 year-old high value property agent in Hollywood). A material culture Americans have been bred to participate in, or have we decided that we are entitled? What does this guitar represent but a sick nostalgia of a rocker before the Bar exam. Economies are based on worse things.

Epoxy Clarinet
I have a buddy who has two epoxy clarinets and one of African ebony, you know, the kind that Pete Fountain would have played. Which one does he play? The ebony one, I'm sure you guessed. The epoxy, he says, sounds cold.

I asked him, why don't you work with the armature material and type, reed material and thickness, articulate with slight manipulations of his lips, grimaces that make him sound warmer (articulation), drink a little more wine to hear differently, look at a evocative picture; I've asked him about every conceivable manipulation of his materials both mechanistic and articulative, add sugar and stir in lemon with a desire to make a lighter footprint, but nothing doing. It cannot be done, I am told, but that's a crock.

There will be a time, within the next twenty years, when wood will be a costly issue. It is costly now, and the price raises itself in a rhythm of car engines and chain saws in the night. There is a unity in things that make the musician feel the same as a person, who lives at the edge of a city, hears the pulse of activity but disregards it at their expense. There is strange atmosphere on the horizon and a loss of wood products is coming at us.

I've tried graphite guitars, and it would be the guitar I would want on a raft trip because it would serve as an oar in double duty. It is waterproof, and I really like that aspect of it, but I wouldn't want to attempt to elicit human feeling out of it. The notes fall flatly to the floor as broken pieces of glass, as the sound is thin and raspy.

As a good trooper, well aware of the footprint that the guitar making trade leaves, I did modify the strings I used towards a more mellow sound, shape my fingernails to articulate with more dolce, I winced to get a more sweet sound, looked at pictures of forests, drank wine to get in the mood, and I had my wife near me and she smiled, but nothing doing. The graphite classical guitar is from hell.

Nowhere near a real classical guitar sound came from this graphite guitar. The steel stringed graphite guitar sounds fine, can be modified to suit me, but I don't generally perform on a steel string acoustic guitar.

Seems to me to be a time to hang on to whatever guitar you have. And if you are seeking to purchase an exotic, or even a new Brazilian rosewood guitar, for the sake of the Earth, ask about the legality of the wood. I feel dirty having knowingly purchased illegal wooded guitars in the past. It is not our right to do this anymore.

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