Julian Gaffney

Julian Gaffney's craft is the inheritance of three of America's most distinguished names in lutherie. A lifelong obsession with the instrument took him first to the Galloup School of Lutherie for formal training, then to New York, where he spent seven and a half years at the bench of Roger Sadowsky — building, setting up, and repairing guitars for some of the world's most demanding players, and contributing to the first Sadowsky acoustic instruments in more than two decades.

A subsequent apprenticeship with Ervin Somogyi — arguably the most revered name in modern steel-string lutherie — took him to California and gave him what he calls a new level of consideration for the acoustic guitar. He now works independently from a small shop in Beacon, New York, producing a modest number of instruments each year, each shaped by an unhurried devotion to workmanship, tone, and design.