Guitars

The carved five-string folk guitar and the guitars beside it:

Panama’s own is small, its neck and body hollowed out of one block of cedar or another local wood, with wooden pegs and, on traditional ones, frets of waxed string and no metal anywhere. Players tune it to one of two traditional tunings to accompany sung verse, and its nylon strings are ordinary guitar trebles. Its four-string relative is played more for dancing than for singing. In a folk dance band it is the electric guitar and the bass that back the accordion, so a band putting its line-up together will want to look through accordions as well.

Nylon strings, steel strings and pickups:

the strings decide who a guitar suits. Nylon is kind to a beginner’s fingertips and a classical guitar’s wide neck keeps the fingers apart, which is why teachers start children on one. A steel-string acoustic is louder and brighter, with a slimmer neck: the guitar for strumming and singing. An electroacoustic adds a pickup and a built-in tuner so it can go straight into the sound system, which suits a worship team or a small gig. Among acoustics, a solid top of spruce or cedar opens up with years of playing, while a laminated top is tougher and cheaper. Electrics split between single-coil guitars in the Stratocaster mould, bright and clean, and humbucker guitars like the Les Paul, thicker and quieter with distortion. A child torn between a first guitar and a first keyboard can try the other side under piano and keyboards.

Yamaha student guitars against US-made Fenders and Gibsons:

a Yamaha classical or folk guitar for a beginner costs under $200 new in Panama, often sold as a pack with a bag and strap. A secondhand one at that level saves little, and the saving is gone if it needs a setup before it plays in tune. A US-made Fender or Gibson runs from about $1,800 to $3,000 new, and those hold their value much better second-hand, because a good neck and good hardware last for decades, provided the serial number checks out.

Necks, bridges and headstock logos on a used guitar:

sight down the neck from the headstock: a slight bow is normal, a twist is not. Ask whether the truss rod still turns: a seized one has no cheap fix. Grooves worn into the first frets mean a refret is coming. On an acoustic, try to slide a sheet of paper under the back edge of the bridge, since a lifting bridge needs regluing, and check the top behind it for a belly. Strings sitting very high near the body on an older acoustic can mean a neck reset, the dearest repair a guitar gets. Plug an electric into an amp and turn every knob and flick every switch: crackle means dirty pots or a tired jack. Copies with a Gibson or Fender logo on the headstock do circulate, so look the serial up with the maker and compare the headstock shape with the genuine model. On a carved folk guitar, look for cracks running along the grain of the body and make sure the wooden pegs hold their tuning through a whole song.

Headstock, serial and setup in the photos:

shoot both sides of the headstock, the serial number, the neck from the side, the frets up close and, on an acoustic, the bridge and the soundhole label. Say when it was last set up and with which strings, what has been changed, from pickups and tuners to the nut, and whether it is left-handed, because left-handed players search for exactly that. Mention the case, and on an electroacoustic whether the preamp works. For a carved folk guitar, give the maker and the wood if you know them. A folk player coming from Ocú to try one will want to hear it in its usual tuning before talking money, so tune it the evening before: wooden pegs take a while to settle.