Guitar Repair and Building Program - The Craft

Working in guitar repair and construction finds the individual faced with new and challenging work every day. Music stores, repair shops and manufacturers are in need of skilled individuals for maintaining, repairing and restoring guitars, mandolins, banjos and other fretted instruments.

This is very hands-on work where a typical day in the shop will find a variety of set-up work optimizing the playability of customer instruments and store inventory. Other repair work includes replacing nuts, saddles, tuners and frets as well as re-gluing bridges,and repairing cracked wood.

It is very rewarding work as the instruments are frequently very near and dear to their owners, and it is the type of work where you can not only see, but feel and hear the results of a job well done. Each instrument is unique and so are its problems. It is the job of a technician to identify and understand each problem and come up with the ideal solution.

Some of our students have gone to work with top guitar building shops, producing fine stringed instruments that are shipped all over the world. For others, self employment is a goal, and with experience and hard work that is also a possible future.

Many of the best builders started in repair work and credit that experience with helping them design and build instruments that sound great, play well, and will continue to do so for many years.