Welcome to the first in a series of articles profiling UK-based luthiers. I will in the main cover independent craftsmen who make instruments not generally found in the mainstream, mass-produced market. Some will be established and some not. The idea is to bring to your attention some of the people who ply their trade nationally and who are able to make you a great instrument should you so desire. In today's market, it can often be beneficial to have a guitar custom-made and tailored to your personal requirements, rather than splash out on a name from one of the mass-produced brands.

I would like to introduce you in this article to Jones Kendall guitars. The operation is a partnership between Steve Jones and Colin Kendall, based in Bury in the north of England. Steve is a working musician and carpenter. Luthering is in his blood - his grandfather was an organ builder. Steve also plays in a well respected blues duo with Emily Druce, a fine singer whom he met when she commissioned him to build her a guitar.

Colin Kendall, formerly an arts and crafts teacher, has been making folk instruments since the mid 90s. They share a passion forpre-war American guitars and now recreate models from that era.

I first met Steve when he called asking if he could come over and view a couple of my Oscar Schmidt
Stella 12-strings. He had been commissioned by John Anderson to build him a 12-string based upon an early Oscar Schmidt Stella. Anderson is the secretary of the European Blues Federation and runs a club in the Forest of Dean called the Blue Front Blues Room (named after the Blue Front Cafe, Mississippi, where Jimmy Holmes and Bud Spires keep alive the tradition of Bentonia acoustic blues).

Steve and John paid me a visit to measure up two of my OS Stella 12-strings. They were to make a derivative model based upon my two. I was impressed with his attitude, and in particular a little 6-string parlour guitar he'd made and brought with him. Upon playing this guitar I was taken with the fullness and clarity of sound that came from it and this led me to explore some of the other guitars that they were producing.

The first was an almost exact replica of Herman Weissenborn's Style-1 guitar. Weissenborn was born in 1865 and by the early 1900s he was firmly established in Los Angles as a luthier.

In 1915, the Panama Pacific Exposition was held in San Francisco and brought about a huge demand for Hawaiian music and the instruments needed to play it. Although he also made parlour-style guitars and ukuleles, his Hawaiian steel guitars have become the stuff of legend, and these have secured his place in the Hall Of Fame of luthiers.

Finding the originals are 'end of the rainbow' dreams, so if you want to re-create the style and sound of that very creative and musically innovative era, then the Jones Kendall (JK) model is ideal. It's Grafted from streaked mahogany (the originals are koa) and produces a beautifully sweet, yet glass-like sound. The JK Weissenborn is wedge-shaped from nut to base with a flat top and a rounded back, which makes it a very comfortable guitar to play lap style. It has a Brazilian rosewood bridge and fingerboard, Mini Grover tuners and spruce bracing with bone appointments.

Secondly, there's a great buy for blues players - the Jones Kendall N1 (resonator). The N1 is a combination of traditional design and modern construction techniques. It has pedal-steel like qualities and the solid mahogany body and neck add brightness to the overall sound. It has nickel-plated brass parts and vintage-style three-on-a-plate tuners. All JK guitars feature hand-spun resonator cones.

Take a look at the accompanying photograph to appreciate the workmanship.

The least expensive handmade guitar in the range is the Lowry at £1575 including case. Steve first made this guitar for his dad's 50th birthday. It's called the Lowry because his father originally grew up in the Salford street which are so well depicted in Lowry's paintings.

It has 14 frets to the body, styled in the classic parlour genre with a stunning sitka spruce top and English walnut back and sides. The individual strutting patterns and tuned plates ensure that the range and tone produced is unique for an instrument of its body size. It is equally at home with delicate arpeggios, forceful soloing or as a strummed accompanying guitar, making it a very versatile and great all-round guitar to play.

It has rosewood bindings, mother of pearl soundhole inlay, Honduras mahogany neck, ebony fingerboard, pyramid bridge (Stella genre) and even a peg veneer with Grover tuning machines.

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