A month-long apprenticeship with Craig and Alicia Carter in Petrolia, Northern California. Craig and Alicia Carter specialise in processing Redwood soundboards. Had hands-on experience to hand-split Red Wood and Spruce and to re-saw them into soundboards.

Four months’ apprenticeship in Mountain View, California with Steve Newberry. We spent most of the time in streamlining and re-organising Steve’s workshop and visiting the workshops of many luthiers. The experience stands me in good stead now, in setting up my own workshop. I also made a steel string acoustic during my stint with Steve. My stint with Steve was cut short because of a shop accident in which I severed my left index finger flexor tendon.

Two months' apprenticeship in Ensenada, Mexico with Boaz Elkayam, where I got an insight into the Snieder Kasha Design and also Boaz’s Clarita Negra.

Almost two years’ apprenticeship with Kenny Hill, in Felton, California, by far, the longest and most fruitful one, in that, Kenny understood my needs well and encouraged me to work at absolutely all the aspects of guitar making. Assisting Kenny in the conduct of his Guitar Making Workshops was a great opportunity for me to reinforce my knowledge.

I have attended many workshops and lectures at two Healdsburg Guitar Makers Festivals, spoken to many luthiers namely, Brian Burns, Irwin Somogyi, Randy Angella, the late Richard Snieder, Tom Ribbeke, Charles Fox, Frank Ford, Hideo Kamimoto, Fred Campbell, Richard Hoover, Abe Wechter, Fred Carlson, Mike Lewis, Jeff Traugat and visited the workshops of most of these luthiers. I acknowledge their sharing their knowledge and extending their support that has helped set up my shop.

It’s inevitable that I must specially acknowledge Kenny Hill for sharing his knowledge without any reservations whatsoever and giving me a free run of the entire workshop, office and showroom. My experience with him is the one single factor that emboldened me to give up my day job to build guitars full time.