1a

*Classic living example = a 664 mm José Ramírez 1a concert (Madrid), the guitar players mean. Current order = Tradicional (1A), 650 mm. YAML introduced: 1965 is public cedar on the 1a and the 2a, not the birth of the 664 mm guitar. 1ª on a label means first class, so a Tablao, an Especial, a Centenario, and a flamenco can wear it. Not a 2a. Not the 10-string. Not Manuel Ramírez’s 1912. No Gibson SKUs. Mixed inch/mm flagged on the Met’s 25 3/4" (654 mm), 39 3/4 in. (100.9 cm), 14 5/8 in. (37.1 cm), and 4 1/8 in. (10.4 cm), and on Musician’s Friend’s 25.59" (650 mm) and 2.28" (52 mm). Do not average the nuts or the scales.*

Construction

The job was a classical guitar loud enough for the room Segovia was playing. No microphone. An orchestra in the program, if the night called for one. The symmetrical fan Madrid still took from Torres was the starting point. It was not the guitar he kept.

The shop is older than that outline. José Ramírez I (1858–1923) went to Francisco González in 1870, at twelve (the house; Amalia to Kazu Suwa). R.E. Brune has him with the González widow in 1880, San Jerónimo 15. The company date is 1882 (Wikipedia, Ramírez Guitars; the factory). Siccas puts the first independent bench in the Rastro between 1880 and 1882. 1890 is the move to Concepción Jerónima 2, held until 1995. A short Wikipedia page on José I says he opened in 1890. That sentence folds the move into the founding. Don’t.

He taught his brother Manuel (1864–1916) and his son, José II. In 1891 Manuel was meant to open Paris and opened a rival Madrid shop instead. They stopped speaking (Wikipedia). Manuel’s 1912 is the other Segovia guitar. José I also taught Julián Gómez Ramírez (Siccas). The Julián Gómez Ramírez beside Django Reinhardt’s Selmer at the Cité de la Musique is that maker (selmer-maccaferri, citing Dregni). Not this 1a. Not Manuel’s bench.

José II died in 1957. Alfredo, who kept the books, had died in 1954. José Ramírez III (José Ramírez Martínez, May 1922–1995) had been in the shop since he was 18 and ran the house from 1957 to 1988 (Wikipedia). José II sold the son’s experiments before he could hear them settle (factory biography). The length he kept was 664 mm — the one that projected “without being too uncomfortable.”

Wikipedia: by 1960 Segovia borrowed his first Ramírez and toured with it. Manuel Contreras built that guitar in the shop. Longer scale, larger body, asymmetrical bracing instead of the symmetrical Torres fan. Gruhn dates the concert guitar to about 1960, for a large hall or an orchestra. Contreras had joined in 1959, stayed three years, then opened his own shop. A later Contreras with “Ramírez bracing” is his guitar.

Australia is two tellings. ABC, Belén Rodrigo, 4 June 2016: Amalia says that in 1960 her father put the experiments into one guitar, Segovia kept it, and Australia heard it. The house’s 2025 English page: they met in 1952, he brought a spruce guitar Segovia called “squeaky and poor,” a nine-year search followed, and in 1961 Segovia took one of those guitars to Australia. Don’t pick 1960 or 1961. Neither date is a catalog page for a 1a.

Cedar is a different claim from the 664 mm scale. Amalia, on the house site in 2024: the first guitar she calls the Segovia model was 1963, a red-cedar top. An apprentice sent for neck stock came back with top wood. It sat on a metal plate overnight and did not twist. He built on it. The same page calls that guitar “now 60 years old” in a 2024 piece. Her year is 1963. Don’t subtract for her.

Public cedar is 1965. Wikipedia: José III put western red cedar (Thuja plicata) on the 1a and 2a that year. GSI, on a 1965 1a stamped PC: the first year cedar tops were sold to the public. Spruce did not vanish. A 1964 on Reverb is spruce and Brazilian. Gruhn’s 1950 is European Alpine spruce and a symmetrical fan; his 1970 is western red cedar and an asymmetrical fan, stiffer on the treble. YAML introduced: 1965 is that public cedar 1a. The 1960 concert guitar is older. The 1963 cedar instrument, in Amalia’s telling, is one guitar.

1A on the label is a grade. The house, 30 March 2022: it means first class. Handmade models from the Aniversario through the Tradicional to the flamencas get it. A player who says “a 1a” means the concert guitar. Amalia and José IV coined Tradicional in the late 1980s for what José III had built in the 1960s with Segovia. GSI, from José III’s letter to George Dauphanais, 24 May 1983: late 1960s through the 1970s the exports were a blue-label 1a and a red-label 2a. The 2a had inferior back and side wood. Not this table.

The gold “Segovia Model” sticker is the distributor’s. Same letter: Jim Sherry had it pasted over part of the Ramírez label in the 1970s, on 1as and on 2as, without permission. Ramírez had not approved a Segovia model. The house now prints “Segovia model” and dates a first one to 1963. Keep the letter and the page. Gold is not a grade above blue.

The journeymen built them. GSI: from the 1950s José III was maestro. A signature under the label means the guitar passed him, not that he made every cut. AM is Antonio Martinez, MT Mariano Tezanos Castro, PC Pedro Contreras Valbuena (GSI; Parkening uses the same MT). A stamp names a bench. It does not count a year.

José IV (José Enrique Ramírez García, May 1953–June 2000) apprenticed in 1971, made first officer in 1977, and from 1988 ran the shop with his sister. The century page: players could not use 664 mm, so he carried the projection onto 650 mm. That is the Tradicional you order. Beside it, the biography: José III and José IV designed a 650 mm guitar in 1986 and called it the C86. “His son José Enrique” later kept 650 mm and renamed it the Special. José IV’s given names are José Enrique. The century page also credits him with the Especial, for players who wanted a faster answer. Don’t invent a second man in that sentence. The Especial is not the Tradicional.

Amalia was born in October 1955 (GSI), started in the shop in 1976, and came back after other training. Her interview calls her the link from the fourth generation to the fifth: her nephews Cristina and José Enrique, José IV’s children. The about page, 2026, has those two running the company under her. A video title that calls her the fifth generation is the wrong count.

Concepción Jerónima 2 until 1995. Her interview splits the firm: workshop at General Margallo 10, shop at Calle de la Paz 8. José III’s large room was at Ventas. ABC has her at 32 disciples there. A room, not a 1a census.

The table is today’s Tradicional. Cedar or spruce, Indian rosewood plus a cypress inner side unless you order another back, 650 mm, 52.5 mm bone nut, ebony, Exagon tuners, French polish or polyurethane, an Indian-rosewood reed against wolf notes, Manzano case in the price. The Cámara of 1983 is a separate José III model with the same aim. Don’t read the reed back onto a 1965 1a.

Not this guitar. Manuel’s 1912: spruce, Brazilian, 25 3/4" (654 mm) on the Met card, Santos Hernández’s hands in Manuel’s shop. The house now copies it, 30 copies, 654 mm, also stamped 1A because the stamp means first class. The Tablao is José I’s flamenco. The 10-string is Yepes. The 8-string is José Tomás. Conservatorio, Preludio, and Sencilla are second-class officers’ practice guitars. The E and R lines are José IV’s student guitars (GSI). No Gibson SKUs.

Players

The early Segovia guitar is Manuel’s, so it gets named and then it leaves.

Andrés Segovia — more than one José Ramírez, and one guitar that is not a 1a. Wikipedia, Manuel Ramírez: in 1912 he came to Arlabán to rent something better than his Benito Ferrer for the Ateneo. Manuel gave him the guitar made largely by Santos Hernández for Antonio Jiménez Manjón. Concerts and records, 1912–1937, including Town Hall, New York, 1929. A crack, then a Hermann Hauser. Bruné on the Met card dates the visit 1913. The object is a 1912. Keep both. Wikipedia says widow Emilita gave it to the Met. Bruné says Segovia gave it, with a 1937 Hauser, in 1986. Don’t pick. Not a 1a. Not a comp.

The José Ramírez instruments will not collapse into one serial. By 1960 he toured the Contreras-built 664 mm guitar (Wikipedia). Australia is 1960 (ABC) or 1961 (the house’s English page). Amalia’s 2024 page: he played the 1963 cedar “for a long time.” The century page says the 1A was the only one he played for the last more than ten years of his life. ABC has her saying that from the Australia guitar until his death he always played a Ramírez — a Ramírez, not one number.

Two later guitars stay apart. GSI’s 1969 1a, cedar, Brazilian, 664 mm, nut 54 mm, stamped AM: GSI says he played it from 1969 until 1980. The Ramírez III text they translate says number 3.339 “was habitually played by maestro Segovia in his concerts, during 1969 and successive years.” Wikipedia: in 1979 the shop sent its best guitars, he chose one by José Ramírez IV, and that was the guitar for the rest of his life. He died 2 June 1987. Successive years from 1969, a 1979 guitar by the son, and “the only one for more than ten years” are not one object. Artist-owned — not a comps tape.

Christopher Parkening — 1967, stamped MT. Classical Guitar (Mark Small, Summer 2015): late 1960s, Sherry-Brener in Chicago, about 500 Ramírez guitars, Brazilian backs, most of them cedar. He has not found a better one. The “Bach guitar” is a 1967 MT. His note on the Met page, May 2023: in Chicago in 1969 Jim Sherry gave him that guitar rather than sell it. MT is Mariano Tezanos Castro. Records he lists on it: Romanza (1969), Parkening Plays Bach (1972), The Christopher Parkening Album (1973), Parkening and the Guitar (Grammy nomination, 1976), parts of In the Spanish Style (1986), parts of The Artistry of Christopher Parkening (1993). The Met card calls the top European spruce, Brazilian back and ribs, Spanish-cedar neck. The magazine’s room was mostly cedar. The card says spruce. Don’t relabel it. Card size: height 39 3/4 in. (100.9 cm), width 14 5/8 in. (37.1 cm), depth 4 1/8 in. (10.4 cm). Mix flagged. Not Gruhn’s 1970 bouts. Artist-owned — not a comp.

Not this six-string. Yepes’s 10-string was conceived in 1963 (Wikipedia) and built by José III; the factory says the beginning of the 1960s. That page also calls Segovia and Yepes players of Ramírez six-strings before it. No Yepes side is pinned to a 1a here. José Tomás’s 8-string was for vihuela and lute. Barrios’s recorded guitar, in Brune’s Vintage Guitar piece, is a 1911 José Ramírez I, the old domed “ahuevada” form. Not a 1a.

Shop lines that set Sting, Chet Atkins, Sabicas, and Lee Ritenour next to Segovia have not tied a 1a to a song here.

Rarity

You can order a Tradicional. It is built when you ask. It is 650 mm, with a cypress inner side and a choice of polish. It is not a 1965 cedar 1a, and it is not number 3.339.

No year book of 1as. None invented. Amalia’s interview gives three figures and no years attached: her father at Ventas “reached sales of one thousand guitars”; her brother at General Margallo “didn’t produce more than one hundred and thirty”; the shop was “making between sixty and seventy” Tradicional guitars, the ones players call 1A, which also sit under the Centenario, the Aniversario, and the Élite. Don’t make those a per-year census, and don’t add them. ABC’s 32 disciples is the Ventas room.

AM, MT, and PC name an officer. They do not say how many 1as left in 1965. The signature says the guitar passed José III. It does not say he built it. That is why a first cedar year has no total.

Thinner than the run: a spruce concert guitar from before public cedar; a clean Brazilian-back 1a, before Indian rosewood was the ordinary back; a guitar with a Segovia serial. The gold sticker is the opposite of rare. Sherry put it on 1as and on 2as. Parkening’s 1967 and number 3.339 are one guitar each.

Value

Informal estimate, 21 October 2026. Not an appraisal.

Ask versus sold. Segovia’s 3.339 and Parkening’s 1967 are not comps. A new 650 mm Tradicional is not a 1967 at 664 mm. No period dollar list for a 1a this pass. Brune’s 150 to 500 pesetas is the c. 1916 José I catalog, a Model 26 or a custom deluxe. Not this guitar.

New street. Factory Tradicional €11,250, Manzano case included, to order (guitarrasramirez.com). No US shelf price this pass. Don’t convert the euro. Other 1A-class lists, not this guitar: Especial €10,469; Centenario €24,655; the Manuel Ramírez reproduction €19,206.

Used modern. No Reverb Price Guide band this pass. Flag: thin sold-comp access. Named asks, not hammers, not an average: 2024 Traditional, Madagascar and cedar, $10,900; 2007 C650 Tradicional $5,999; 2006 cedar and CSA rosewood $9,828 (from $10,400); 2002 Tradicional $10,188.63. Different woods. Different years.

Vintage / collectible. More asks. 1964 spruce and Brazilian $7,950. A 1966 $7,225 (from $8,650). A 1967 $8,376.71. Galerie’s 1968 $6,768.67 — that listing measures 665 mm, so it is one guitar, not the 664 mm figure. A 1974 Brazilian, 664 mm and a 54 mm nut, $7,500 (from $8,000). A 1977 Brazilian $6,150 (from $6,950). A 1966 stamped A.M., Brazilian, listed as ex Nicolas Alfonso, $12,290.33 (from $14,046.09). A name on the card is not a reason to lift the others. Don’t average a provenance ask with a shop ask. Don’t paste 2a, flamenco, or 10-string money onto this six-string.

See also

• selmer-maccaferri — Django’s oval-hole Selmer; the Julián Gómez Ramírez beside it is not this Madrid 1a
• godin-multiac — nylon on a thin chambered body with a 13-pin jack; not a Spanish concert classical
• guild-m-20 — a steel-string mahogany concert; not a nylon 1a

Sources

• Guitarras Ramírez, Traditional (1A) — 650 mm; 52.5 mm bone nut; red cedar / Indian rosewood with double cypress; spruce and other backs to order; French polish or polyurethane; Exagon; high-tension strings, 3rd in carbon; 12th-fret height 3.50 / 4.50 mm approximate; internal rosewood reed; mosaic may change; €11,250 with Manzano case; to order; 1960s, José III with Segovia
• Guitarras Ramírez, What is a 1A guitar? (30 March 2022) — 1A means first class; players mean the Tradicional; name coined by Amalia and José IV, late 1980s; José III, 1960s, with Segovia; Conservatorio, Preludio, and Sencilla are not 1A
• Guitarras Ramírez, a century and a half — Tablao; 1A at 664 mm; Segovia’s last ten-plus years; synthetic varnish; cedar; ebony bar; 10-string for Yepes; 8-string for José Tomás; Cámara; José IV’s 650 mm, carbon bar, Especial
• Guitarras Ramírez, History of the Segovia model, Amalia Ramírez (6 August 2024) — 1963 red-cedar guitar she calls the first Segovia model; apprentice and metal plate; “now 60 years old” in that 2024 piece
• Guitarras Ramírez, Segovia model and red cedar (14 January 2025) — 1952 spruce, “squeaky and poor”; nine years; 1961 Australia; cedar in 1963
• Guitarras Ramírez, José Ramírez III — born May 1922; in the shop at 18; Alfredo died 1954; 664 mm; C86 in 1986 with José IV; “his son José Enrique” renamed it Special at 650 mm; Cámara 1983; 10-string at the beginning of the 1960s
• Guitarras Ramírez, About us — Cristina and José Enrique under Amalia; José IV 1953–2000, apprentice 1971, first officer 1977, with Amalia from 1988; her apprenticeship 1976
• Guitarras Ramírez, Interview with Amalia Ramírez — Ventas “one thousand”; Margallo “one hundred and thirty”; “sixty and seventy” Tradicional; General Margallo 10 and Calle de la Paz 8; she is the fourth generation, nephews the fifth; José IV died 2000
• Guitarras Ramírez, shop — Especial €10,469; Centenario €24,655; other 1A-class lists on the same index
• Guitarras Ramírez, Manuel Ramírez (1A) — 30-copy reproduction of the 1912; 654 mm; spruce; €19,206. Not the Tradicional
• Wikipedia, Ramírez Guitars — 1882; Concepción Jerónima 2 in 1890; Manuel’s 1891 split; by 1960, Contreras-built 664 mm tour guitar, larger body, asymmetrical bracing; Contreras from 1959, three years; cedar on the 1a and 2a in 1965
• Wikipedia, José Ramírez III — head 1957–1988; met Segovia 1952; longer scale, asymmetrical bracing; Cámara 1983; 1979 choice was a guitar by José IV, for the rest of his life
• Wikipedia, José Ramírez (luthier) — 1858–1923; González in 1870; this page’s “opened his shop in 1890”
• Wikipedia, Manuel Ramírez — 1912 Ateneo; largely Santos Hernández, for Manjón; used 1912–1937; Town Hall 1929; then Hauser; Emilita’s gift to the Met
• Wikipedia, Ten-string guitar of Yepes — conceived 1963, built by José Ramírez III; Segovia and Yepes as players of Ramírez six-strings
• Wikipedia, José Tomás — eight-string by José Ramírez III
• The Met, Manuel Ramírez, 1912 — Bruné 2022: 1913 visit; Santos Hernández; 25 3/4" (654 mm); spruce; Brazilian; Segovia’s 1986 gift with a 1937 Hauser
• The Met, José Ramírez III, 1967 — Parkening, acc. 2010.502; European spruce on the card; Brazilian; Spanish cedar neck; 39 3/4 in. (100.9 cm), 14 5/8 in. (37.1 cm), 4 1/8 in. (10.4 cm); his May 2023 note, MT, Chicago 1969, the album list
• Vintage Guitar, R.E. Brune, 1904 José Ramírez I — González widow, 1880; ahuevada; Barrios’s 1911 José Ramírez; Concepción Jerónima by at least 1890; c. 1916 catalog, Model 26 or custom, 150–500 pesetas. Not a 1a price
• Guitar Salon International, Myths and Facts (11 April 2011) — letter of 24 May 1983 to George Dauphanais; blue 1a, red 2a; Sherry’s gold label on both; signature means approval
• Guitar Salon International, 1969 “1a AM” ex Segovia — no. 3.339; AM = Antonio Martinez; cedar; Brazilian; 664 mm; nut 54 mm; GSI’s 1969–1980 beside “1969 and successive years”
• Guitar Salon International, 1965 “1a PC” — PC = Pedro Contreras Valbuena; GSI: first year cedar tops were available to the public
• Guitar Salon International, the Ramírez dynasty — José IV’s Especial and the E and R lines; died June 2000; Amalia born October 1955
• Classical Guitar, Mark Small, on Parkening (Summer 2015) — about 500 at Sherry-Brener; Brazilian; most cedar; 1967 MT Bach guitar at the Met
• Gruhn Guitars, Ramírez and classical design (archived) — concert guitar about 1960; 1950 vs 1970; 26-1/8"; 2-1/8"; 14-1/2" / 11-1/8" / 4-1/4"; cedar; ebony bar; cypress-reinforced Brazilian sides; asymmetrical fan, stiffer on the treble; headstock 9° vs 20°
• Galerie des Luthiers, José Ramírez III, 1966 — 664 mm; nut 54 mm; cedar; Brazilian; Fustero; body 487 mm, 285/240/370 mm, 102/105 mm; 1600 g
• ABC, Belén Rodrigo, 4 June 2016 — Amalia: 1960 guitar and the Australia tour; a Ramírez until his death; cedar; 32 disciples at Ventas
• Siccas Guitars, José Ramírez I — Rastro, 1880–1882; Concepción Jerónima 2 in 1890; he taught Julián Gómez Ramírez
• Kazu Suwa, Amalia Ramírez — apprenticeship from 1870; he taught Manuel and José II; nephews José Enrique (Ramírez V) and Cristina
• Ramírez Guitars (South Africa), Tradicional (1A) — dealer sheet lists a cedar neck, 650 mm, nut 52.5 mm. Madrid’s table omits neck wood
• Musician’s Friend, 1a Traditional — 19-1/4" body, upper 11", lower 14 5/8", depths 3-7/8" and 4-1/4"; 25.59" (650 mm); nut printed 2.28" (52 mm)
• Reverb, 1964 1A spruce / Brazilian — ask $7,950
• Reverb, 1968 1A, Galerie des Luthiers — ask $6,768.67; this guitar measures 665 mm, nut 53.5 mm. Do not average with 664 mm
• Reverb, Ramírez classical asks, mid-October 2026 — asks, not solds: 2024 Traditional $10,900; 2007 C650 $5,999; 2006 cedar/CSA $9,828 from $10,400; 2002 Tradicional $10,188.63; 1966 $7,225 from $8,650; 1966 A.M. ex Nicolas Alfonso $12,290.33 from $14,046.09; 1967 $8,376.71; 1974 Brazilian $7,500 from $8,000; 1977 Brazilian $6,150 from $6,950. No Price Guide band this pass