Or something like that. In doing some research, I was a bit surprised to see that many guitar builders seem to have strong preferences and opinions regarding Picea Abies (European Spruce) grown in different micro climates. Bruce Sexauer for instance, insists that Italian spruce is the best, and is very different from say Swiss or German spruce which is of course biologically the same species grown in essentially the same Alpine region. I don't dismiss this as nonsense, as some of these builders have years of experience and seem to have enough empirical evidence to form these beliefs.
I think Paul Hostetter sums it up best here where he states that while each tree is the same species, they have to be evaluated on an individual basis which includes the same set of standards no matter where it was grown:
http://www.lutherie.net/eurospruce.html
What I do have questions about is why haven't these builders taken such passion and formed these same opinions relative to native spruces found in the US and Canada? No one seems to have any preferences that I am aware for Red Spruce from Georgia vs. Nova Scotia? How about New Mexico Engelmann vs. British Columbian? Maybe they do and I am just not aware of them? Anyway, the growing range for these species is much larger relative to those we see in the Alps. It just makes me wonder why they treat Carpathian spruce from Romania as almost an entirely different species but do not seem to have the same strong opinions about North American spruces.
Sean
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