James is a professional guitar maker and has made a splendid job of making the renaissance lute in rosewood with holly spacers. You can see more pictures of his work on http://www.worlandguitars.com/projects/RenLute/Ren%20lute01.html

Philippe is the first of the people on the renaissance course to send pictures of his completed lute back, and very smart it looks too. But then he has been making very fine baroque guitars for some time so it is not surprising! He has used ebony for the ribs and plumwood for the spacer lines between the ribs.

And now he has finished his lute and played the first notes on it. Philippe is the first person to finish, in fact before the course itself!

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Masahiko from Japan has just sent these photos of his mould which all looks just right, as well as the splendid looking striped back of indian rosewood and hard maple which he has built on it. .

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Robert has been selflessly making this lute for his son, Eric. His chosen wood turned out not to be suitable for planing and had to be scraped to thickness. This was exhausting but explains his tribute picture of the Lie Nielson scraper plane!

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Richard writes:

Thank you again for a great journey of woodwork and musicianship, luckily I have a beard as I think that helped me finish the instrument.

The back is ash with ebony strips, the neck and pegbox is Eastern maple with a piece of quilted Western maple on the back of the pegbox. The pegs are cocobolo, the bridge is walnut and the soundboard is engelmann spruce. The finish is Danish oil only. It sounds great!

I have built this instrument over the course of one year in Vancouver Island, Canada and Australia, over a dozen different locations on kitchen tables, workbenches, counter-tops and even on a beach! The people I need to thank are Jane, Susan, Kees, Hugh, John T., Bob & Mary, Bryon, Peter & Gillian, John L. and John M. Thanks for your spaces and encouragement...

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Edmond Beylerian from Michigan, USA has just sent these photos of his mould which looks just fine. He reports having to adjust the cross-sections to get them to fit the spine and outline in spite of taking great care in transferring the tracings from the plans. But the result looks perfect.

Plus now some photos of the lute back in progress. It is being made of a wood called Chechin with white holly strips between each ribs.

Stephen Fine from England has been getting on well with the course as these pictures show. He tells me he is already collecting wood to make a six course version of the lute when he has finished this seven course version in Indian rosewood. I look forward to seeing more pictures of his progress in due course. He writes:

“Fear not, no Titebond as been anywhere near the lute (apart from building the mold). This actually is the first time I have ever used hide glue and although it took a little while to get the hang of it I now really like it. I have built several classical guitars using Titebond but any subsequent instruments will definitely now be built with hide glue.

The further I get into building this lute the more I realise what a subtle and fascinating instrument it is. A wonderful blend of form and function. The builders of old really did know a thing or two about their craft.”