Segovia 1937

Classic living example = the 1937 Munich guitar, Metropolitan Museum of Art 1986.353.1, the one the collection record calls Segovia’s principal concert instrument. YAML introduced: 1937 is the Met’s date and the 4 February 1937 signature Brune read inside, not a catalog, and not the year he first played it in public. The 1931 on the Hauser site, the 1939 Christie’s guitar with a Segovia inscription, a 1937 with a tornavoz, and a 1937 Vienna model are other instruments. A Hauser II, a Hauser III, and a plan-built copy are not this table. Standalone. No Gibson SKUs. Mixed inch/mm flagged. Do not average the two Met dimension sets, or 650 with 652, 653.5, and 654.

Construction

The job was a guitar you could hear at the back of a hall. Segovia was already playing those halls on a 1912 from Manuel Ramírez’s shop. He wanted that Spanish idea from a Munich maker who, until then, had been building in the Viennese style.

Hermann Hauser I was born in Erding on 28 December 1882 and died in Reisbach on 18 October 1952 (German Wikipedia). The Met’s tag is Munich, 1882–1952, Reisbach. His father Josef built zithers, guitars, and fiddles from 1875. Hermann learned in that shop, played in the Munich guitar circle, and from 1922 to 1926 took the terz chair in the Munich Guitar Quartet. The family site’s Munich line for him is Bayerstraße 33 and Müllerstraße 8. German Wikipedia: Emma died in 1943, he ran her string-spinning shop into 1944, and in 1946, asthmatic, he left the bombed city for Reisbach. Between 1920 and 1930 the same article credits him with patents on tops and on the neck-to-body joint. A patent is not a measurement of this guitar.

How he met the Spanish guitar is two stories. German Wikipedia: Miguel Llobet, in Munich in 1913, played a Hauser from then on. Classical Guitar (Kathleen A. Bergeron, Winter 2016): they met at that 1913 concert, Hauser studied how Torres built, and he made several Spanish-style guitars for Llobet before the Munich union invited Segovia, a little over a decade later. R. E. Brune, Vintage Guitar (October 2003): Llobet let Hauser draw the Torres he was playing, and Hauser made nothing in the Spanish style until he met Segovia. Don’t collapse “a drawing, then Segovia” into “Spanish guitars for Llobet from 1913.”

The year of the Segovia meeting is the same kind of split. The Met and Brune: 1924, and Llobet made the introduction. Acoustic Guitar (9 March 2022): 1924, introduced in Munich. Bergeron does not print 1924. She counts a decade on from 1913. German Wikipedia: Segovia visited in 1934. He had the 1912 with him. Santos Hernández built that one in Manuel Ramírez’s shop. The Met’s Hauser page calls it a 1912. Brune’s sentence also hangs “in 1924” on Hernández. Don’t make 1924 a second birth year for the Ramírez. Hauser measured it. German Wikipedia and Guitar Salon’s Hauser I page also put Llobet’s 1859 Torres in his hands. Not La Leona. Not this plate’s guitar.

What he handed over before 1937 will not flatten into one refusal. The Met: “It is said that Hauser brought instruments to Segovia for twelve successive years, but none pleased him until he tried this guitar,” and that Segovia then gave up the 1912. Brune: that story is too clean. Printed programs from 1929 already say the guitar is a Hauser, and he had assumed, wrongly, that Segovia played no Hauser in public before this one. Acoustic Guitar: a 1929, with the Torres design in it, was destroyed in the Spanish Civil War; a 1931 he played for many years. The Hauser site’s page for that 1931 calls it the first of two such guitars, German spruce, Brazilian rosewood, scale 650 mm, Landstorfer machines, and a French line inside: “Pour mon cher ami, le grande maestro Andrès Segovia fait de H. Hauser, Munchen 1931.” The site says the second is the 1937 at the Met. A 1929 destroyed, and a 1931 still on the family page. Don’t merge them. Don’t paste the 1931 sentence into this guitar.

This one is signed and dated 4 February 1937, with a French dedication to Segovia under the fingerboard, on the soundboard (Brune). He thinks it was not finished that day. Bergeron has Hauser handing it over in 1937. Segovia told Brune he did not begin on it until 1938: Hauser sent it by rail, and it kept arriving in German towns Segovia had just left. The program for the Civic Center, Chicago, 13 March 1938, says “Guitar: Hauser.” Brune calls that possibly one of the first times this instrument was the one in public. A program that says Hauser is not a serial number. YAML introduced: 1937 is the signature and the Met’s date.

What he actually did in the box is why makers still trace it. Seven fan struts, the three in the center left square under the bridge instead of rounded, two V struts toward the tail kept low, a thin spruce bridgeplate with the fans notched down onto it (Brune). Brune calls the design a departure from the thin, lightweight, flamenco-inspired guitars he says Spanish makers of that era were building. On this top: 2.21 mm out on the bass wing, over 3 mm behind the treble side of the bridge, and still 2.5–3 mm in many places after it was sanded. The bridge is Indian rosewood on a Brazilian body. The pins are 2 mm. The neck sits 2 mm up, so the strings clear the top by 10 mm and 9 mm, because the saddle slot is too shallow to fix a bad neck angle later. The green in the purfling is gone except under the sweat. Brune, and Julian Bream among others who played and examined it: the body answers at a G, thick top and all.

Hermann Hauser II was already in the shop. German Wikipedia and Acoustic Guitar: he entered in 1930. Bergeron: 1926. Through the years they worked together, the father signed the guitars (German Wikipedia). This signature is the father’s. The son’s hands on this instrument, in a named source, come later. Early 1960s, a microphone fell on it in a studio. Hauser II sanded the top and refinished it. Segovia stopped soon after. The reason he gave, Brune writes, was that the first string had died and nobody could get it back. A reason, not a measurement.

The Met’s use is 1938 until 1962, “principal concert instrument,” and the 1954 article’s “greatest guitar of our epoch.” German Wikipedia’s legacy line is 1937 to 1962, citing that same Met page. The family history page is 1937 to 1970. Acoustic Guitar stops him in the early 1960s, which is when Brune puts the repair and the retirement. Principal is not “only.” 1962 is not 1970. Don’t average them.

It is accession 1986.353.1. Credit line: Gift of Emilita Segovia, Marquessa of Salobreña, 1986 — the Met’s spelling. On view at Fifth Avenue, Gallery 684. Ken Moore (Perspectives, 21 February 2014): a lunch with Segovia in early 1986 to prepare the gift later that year; Segovia and Emilita both. Brune: shortly before his death, Segovia gave this guitar and the 1912. The 92nd Street Y (16 October 2013): in 1987 Segovia presented the pair. Emilita’s name on the credit line, Segovia at the lunch, 1986 against 1987. Don’t pick.

Not this guitar. The 1931, with its own inscription. Christie’s 1939, Munich, also inscribed for him — “fait pour Monsieur Andres Segovia Montevideo” — and sold on from Segovia to Sra. Paz to Rosa Lloret Ortiz. A 1937 Vienna model is still on the books, and it is not this fan (Zavaleta’s ended Reverb listing). Guitar Salon’s other 1937, the one with a bronze tornavoz, is a guitar on Marc Teicholz’s Valseana. Bream’s Hauser I guitars, in the German Wikipedia, are a 1936 and a 1947, plus a Hauser II around 1960. Guitar Salon’s Hauser II page puts him on a 1957 from 1959 to 1963, The Art of Julian Bream. Hauser II’s later guitars for Segovia, including the 1969 no. 851 on that page, are his son’s. A Fleta and a José Ramírez 1a are the other shops (ramirez-1a). A copy off Brune’s drawing is a new guitar.

Players

Do not hang the 1912 Ramírez, the 1929, the 1931, the 1939, a tornavoz 1937, a Vienna 1937, Bream’s 1936 or 1947, a Hauser II, a Fleta, or a 1a on the recordings below. A program that says “Hauser” before this guitar existed is a different instrument.

Andrés Segovia — this guitar, and not only this guitar. The Met: principal concert instrument, 1938 until 1962. In a 1954 article he called it the “greatest guitar of our epoch.” Brune pins the phrase to Guitar Review no. 16. The longer 1954 memory, of seeing what Hauser could do if he built in the Spanish pattern fixed by Torres and Ramírez, is quoted in more than one wording. Acoustic Guitar: “immediately foresaw the potential of this superb artisan, if only his mastery might be applied” to that pattern. Guitar Salon’s rendering adds Stradivari and Guarneri and says “saw,” not “foresaw.” Don’t weld the sentences. German Wikipedia’s paraphrase carries the violin comparison too.

What he did on this one, named: the Chicago program of 13 March 1938, with Brune’s “possibly.” The Met’s 1955 film, in which he talks about Hauser and plays the guitar that page identifies as this 1937. Dynamic CDS 433, The Guitar of Andrés Segovia. Hermann Hauser 1937, is a set of his recordings presented as this instrument (Tom Harper, American Lutherie no. 83, 2005; Julio Gimeno, 2005). No track list in the sources used here, so no piece title. The early-1960s studio accident is Brune’s, not a named album. Artist-owned — not a comps tape. The guitar is in the museum.

Also known to play stays short. Brune names Julian Bream among people who played and examined this box, on the way to saying the body speaks at a G. That is not the 1936, the 1947, or the Hauser II on The Art of Julian Bream. No one else is pinned to 1986.353.1 here.

Rarity

There is one of these. It is in a case at the Met. You cannot order it. Hauser I died in 1952. Reisbach went on without him, and it does not sell this guitar.

Hauser published no count of 1937 concert guitars. Brune says production then was not high. None invented. A label dated 4 February 1937 identifies a guitar. It does not count a year. That is why “the one he finally accepted” is a story, not a census. He had already been building Spanish-pattern guitars, and he kept building them after this one left. The 1939 with Segovia’s name inside is the proof.

What people shop instead is a drawing. Brune measured and photographed it at the museum in the fall of 1991 and published the drawing in American Lutherie no. 31 (1992); the Guild of American Luthiers still sells Plan no. 33, redrawn for 2016. A guitar made from that plan is a new guitar. Hermann Hauser III, in Reisbach, builds to the player. Asked if that includes one meant to sound like this 1937, he told Bergeron that every guitar is made the way the player wants. The family site: 150 to 240 hours, at most 17 guitars a year, about five years on the list. That cap is his workshop now. It is not 1937, and it is not a second original.

Thinner than a copy: this top, with Hauser II’s sanding already in it; the 1931, if it is the guitar the family page still shows; any Hauser I whose interior line is actually the February 1937 dedication. Sweat and a microphone did not turn it into a replica. They also mean you are not looking at an untouched 1937.

Value

Informal estimate, 26 October 2026. Not an appraisal.

The original is not on the market. No hammer for 1986.353.1 turned up this pass. Don’t invent a museum valuation. Ask versus sold, and every figure below is a different guitar. No Reverb Price Guide band for this instrument. Flag: thin sold-comp access.

New street. Nothing from Hermann Hauser I. hauserguitars.de prints no euro price this pass. The living workshop is Hauser III, to order, on the wait above. A new copy is not that wait, and not this guitar. Named ask: Reverb UK, a 2024 Rathbone & Brown “1937 Hauser” reproduction, spruce and Indian rosewood, the listing’s own 650 mm and 52 mm nut, £2,495 from £2,750. Those millimetres belong to the copy.

Used modern. A Hauser III is the modern guitar with the name. Named 2026 asks, not hammers, not this model: Digimart, a 1997 Hauser III on the Llobet pattern, registered 20 July 2026, ¥2,200,000 tax included. Kurosawa Gakki, April 2026, Jubilee no. 14 of 15, ¥6,600,000 tax included. Don’t convert the yen. Don’t average a Llobet model with a numbered Jubilee, and don’t paste either onto 1986.353.1.

Vintage / collectible. One guitar, gift, 1986, Gallery 684. No 2026 ask. No 2026 sold. Other Hauser I hammers, not comps: Christie’s, 3 April 2009, the 1939 Munich guitar inscribed for Segovia, $134,500 (estimate $70,000–$90,000). Christie’s, 14 October 2011, a 1940 Munich Hauser I, $152,500 (estimate $100,000–$150,000). The 1939 passed through his hands. It is not the guitar in the case. A 1937 Vienna model is a third object. Leave the old hammers on their own labels.

See also

• ramirez-1a — the 1912 he set down for this Hauser, and the Madrid concert guitar he played later; neither is 1986.353.1
• torres-la-leona — the Sevilla pattern in the background; Llobet’s guitar was an 1859 Torres, not this 1856
• selmer-maccaferri — a 1930s guitar with a different internal system; not a Munich fan, and not Segovia’s

Sources

• The Met, Hermann Hauser, Guitar, 1937, 1986.353.1 — principal concert instrument, used 1938 until 1962; “greatest guitar of our epoch,” 1954; Llobet introduced them in 1924; Viennese work, then Spanish models; “it is said,” twelve successive years, none pleased him; gave up the 1912; two-piece Brazilian rosewood back and sides, two-piece spruce top; spruce, rosewood, mahogany, bone or ivory, ebony; 38 × 14 3/8 × 4 in. (96.5 × 36.5 × 10.2 cm); Gift of Emilita Segovia, Marquessa of Salobreña, 1986; Gallery 684
• The Met, Andrés Segovia on His Hermann Hauser Guitar (22 March 2022) — 1955 interview, playing the guitar Hauser built for him; featured object is this 1937; alternate dimensions 3 7/8 × 38 7/16 × 14 9/16 in. (9.8 × 97.7 × 37 cm). Do not average with the collection card
• The Met, Ken Moore, Reminiscing on Andrés Segovia (21 February 2014) — lunch in early 1986 to prepare the donation later that year; Segovia and Emilita
• Vintage Guitar, R. E. Brune, “Andre Segovia’s Hauser” (October 2003) — measured at the Met, fall 1991; Guitar Review no. 16 (1954); met 1924 via Llobet; drawing of Llobet’s Torres; no Spanish-style guitar until Segovia, in this telling; Viennese work after Legnani, Stauffer, and that circle; rail delays, Segovia’s own account that he did not begin until 1938; programs from 1929 already say Hauser; Chicago Civic Center, 13 March 1938, “Guitar: Hauser,” possibly this guitar; signed and dated 4 February 1937, French dedication under the fingerboard, probably finished later; sweat; top 2.21 mm to over 3 mm, still 2.5–3 mm after Hauser II sanded and refinished it in the early 1960s, fallen microphone; he stopped, the first string “died”; seven fans, three center fans square under the bridge, low V struts, spruce bridgeplate; Indian rosewood bridge, Brazilian back and sides; 2 mm pins; 1.5 mm veneer under the board from the 12th; V-joint head; neck up 2 mm; 10 mm and 9 mm at the bridge; bridge arched 1.5 mm; green purfling faded; Bream among those who played and examined it; body resonance at G; donation told as Segovia’s, with the 1912, shortly before his death
• Hauser Guitars, history (English) — Josef’s shop; Hermann I, Bayerstraße 33 / Müllerstraße 8, then Reisbach after the bombing; played by Segovia between 1937 and 1970, now at the Met; Hauser III, 150–240 hours, at most 17 a year, about five years. The 1970 end is this page’s, not the Met’s
• Hauser Guitars, 1931 personal copy for Segovia — collaboration from 1924; 1931 the first of two, 1937 the second, at the Met; German spruce, Brazilian, 650 mm on the 1931; Landstorfer; French inscription quoted there. Not 1986.353.1
• Wikipedia (German), Hermann Hauser (Gitarrenbauer) — 28 December 1882, Erding; 18 October 1952, Reisbach; Josef from 1875; Llobet and a Hauser from the 1913 Munich visit; Munich Guitar Quartet, terz, 1922–1926; patents 1920–1930; Segovia’s visit dated 1934 on this page; 1912 Ramírez by Santos Hernández; Llobet’s 1859 Torres; Hauser II entered 1930, father signed during the collaboration; from 1937 Segovia switched, and the legacy line says he played the Met guitar 1937–1962; Bream on Hauser I guitars of 1936 and 1947, and a Hauser II around 1960; Emma 1943, string shop to 1944, Reisbach 1946; Guitar Review 16 (1954), p. 106
• Acoustic Guitar, Kathrin Hauser (9 March 2022) — 1924, three hours on the Ramírez; 1929 destroyed in the Spanish Civil War; 1931 played for many years; 1937 “the greatest guitar of our epoch,” concerts and recordings into the early 1960s; the 1954 foresaw/applied wording; Hauser II in the shop from 1930, took over 1952
• Classical Guitar, Kathleen A. Bergeron, Kathrin Hauser (Winter 2016) — Llobet 1913, Spanish-style guitars for him; Segovia a decade later, Santos Hernández Ramírez in the room; handed over in 1937; played for decades; Hauser III will build to a player’s wish, including one meant to play like this 1937; her date for Hauser II starting with his father is 1926
• Andrew Schulman, classical-guitar list, 22 September 2003 — with Pollens: 650 mm uncompensated, 653.5 mm compensated; earlier uncompensated split of 650 and 652; neck 51.3 / 61.3 mm; thickness 20.55 / 24.5 mm; spacing 43.4 mm and 57.5 mm; depths 9.04 cm and 9.86 cm; body 48.2 cm front, 48.5 cm back; action 4 mm and 5 mm+ at the 12th, not at pitch. He reports Brune’s 650 mm
• Andrew Schulman, quoting Simon Ambridge, 12 July 2003 — Ambridge and Pollens at 652 mm plus 2 mm, 654 mm; Elliott recalls 652/654, not printed in the Elliott/Burton article
• Guild of American Luthiers, Plan no. 33 / Brune, *American Lutherie* 31 (1992) and 126 (2016) — the measured drawing. A guitar built from it is not the Met’s
• Tom Harper, review of Dynamic CDS 433, *American Lutherie* 83 (2005) — pamphlet, drawings, and a CD presented as Segovia playing this guitar. No titles taken from it here
• Julio Gimeno, Arte Pulsado (23 January 2005) — Guitar Review 16, the 1937, dated 4 February 1937; Dynamic CDS 433
• 92nd Street Y, 16 October 2013 — “in 1987 Andrés Segovia presented” the 1912 and the 1937. Not the credit line
• Christie’s, Hermann Hauser Sr., Munich, 1939 — label Müllerstr. 8, 1939; internal inscription for Segovia, Montevideo; provenance Segovia, Sra. Paz, Rosa Lloret Ortiz. LotSearch: 3 April 2009, $134,500. Not 1986.353.1
• Christie’s, Hermann Hauser Sr., Munich, 1940 — closed 14 October 2011, $152,500. Another guitar. Its scale is not this plate’s
• Christie’s, Hermann Hauser results — 1939 realised $134,500 against $70,000–$90,000; 1940 realised $152,500 against $100,000–$150,000
• Guitar Salon International, Hermann Hauser I — 1924; the 1954 line with Stradivari and Guarneri; 1912 by Santos Hernández; Llobet’s 1859 Torres
• Guitar Salon International, Hermann Hauser II — 1957 Hauser II, Bream 1959–1963, The Art of Julian Bream; 1969 no. 851 for Segovia, with 852 and 850. Not this 1937
• Guitar Salon International, 1937 Hermann Hauser I with tornavoz — same year, bronze tornavoz, Teicholz, Valseana. The card says it is not Segovia’s. No price left on the page this pass
• Wildner, “My Hauser Research Paper,” on hauserguitars.de — Landstorfer machines on Hauser Sr. and Jr. guitars as a class. Not a reading of this headstock
• Reverb, Zavaleta, 1937 Hauser Sr. Vienna model — ended ask $12,500, listed about eleven years before this pass. A Vienna-pattern 1937, not this concert guitar. Price left off the plate as a stale ask
• Reverb UK, Rathbone & Brown 1937 Hauser reproduction — copy ask £2,495 from £2,750; listing prints 650 mm and a 52 mm nut. Not the Met guitar
• Digimart, Hermann Hauser III, 1997 — Llobet-pattern Hauser III; ¥2,200,000 tax included; registered 20 July 2026
• Kurosawa Gakki, Hauser III Jubilee 14/15 (11 April 2026) — ¥6,600,000 tax included; one of 15. Not a 1937