Linda Manzer (original) (raw)

Linda (Jane) Manzer. Guitar builder, b Toronto, 2 Jul 1952. She studied briefly at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax and apprenticed 1974-8 with Jean Larrivée in Toronto and Victoria.

Manzer, Linda

Linda (Jane) Manzer. Guitar builder, b Toronto, 2 Jul 1952. She studied briefly at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax and apprenticed 1974-8 with Jean Larrivée in Toronto and Victoria. Establishing her own shop in Toronto in 1978, Manzer specialized initially in flat-top, steel-string acoustic guitars and then, after studies 1983-4 in New York with James D'Aquisto, began also to make archtop instruments. She had completed some 120 guitars by 1990. Heather Bishop, Liona Boyd, Bruce Cockburn, Mike 'Pepe' Francis, Marie-Lynn Hammond, Gordon Lightfoot, and Sherry Shute have owned Manzer guitars, as have the US guitarists Pat Metheny and Carlos Santana, and the Brazilian singer Milton Nascimento. Manzer has also built several custom-designed and miniature instruments - eg, a charanga for Cockburn, the 42-string 'Pikasso,' the six-string 'Methenytone' and a 12-string tiple for Metheny, and a 20-string gitaroon for the Chilean guitarist Angel Parra.

Suggested Reading

• McLuhan, Michael. 'Frets visits... Toronto, Canada: Manzer guitars,' Frets, Jul 1981
  Rimmer, Steve. 'Linda Manzer: guitar builder,' Canadian Musician, vol 4, Sep-Oct 1982
  Miller, Mark. 'A master builder in the guitar world,' Toronto Globe and Mail, 21 Apr 1984
  Woodard, Josef. 'Metheny's luthier: Linda Manzer,' Frets, Apr 1985
  Berton, Michael. 'Strutting the top,' Guitar Canada, vol 1, Fall 1986
  Viva, Luigi. Pat Metheny: la biografia, los stile, gli strumenti (Padova, Italy, 1989)