Alhambra sent us a guitar for review. I have to confess that until I unpacked it, I didn't know what it was, and I can assure you I was very surprised. As soon as I opened the package, the first thing that caught my attention was its looks, especially the lovely design of the headstock and the bridge, the latter with a curious combination of ebony and maple. The next thing I noticed was that the neck was narrower than a classical guitar's and that the ebony fingerboard wasn't flat; then I understood the reason for its name: this guitar is a cross between a classical and an acoustic. Below I'll describe it part by part.

Top
The top is spruce, with a fairly tight grain free of knots or other defects. Spruce has a brighter timbre than cedar but, unlike cedar, it needs more time to reach its full potential once the top is mounted on the guitar. In this case, the timbre is very pleasant and the sound very lively and with sustain, so I think it promises to improve with time and use. The tone bars and fan bracing are neatly glued and have been properly carved, which undoubtedly contributes to the top's good acoustic response; it also shows good structural stability. As I mentioned earlier, the bridge has an original, unconventional design combining maple and ebony, which is perfectly in tune with the design of the sound hole, which is ebony and is surrounded by a pretty, understated rosette as well as maple and ebony purfling.

Back and sides
The back and sides are Indian rosewood and are properly matched.
The joint of the sides at the tail is finished with a piece of maple, the same material used for the binding.

Looking inside, we find the same neatness as in the top. The linings, the reinforcements used to join the top and back to the sides, are solid wood, and the notches where the cross braces sit are properly made. In addition, vertical reinforcements have been added between the back linings and the top, giving the soundbox more structural stability.

Neck, fingerboard and heel
The neck, as I mentioned, is narrower than that of a classical guitar, and the fingerboard has a 14-inch radius, so musicians used to acoustic and electric guitars will feel right at home. The slim neck, combined with the curved fingerboard, makes playing very comfortable, but when you reach the heel, specifically in the cutaway area, it's a little harder to play the last frets. Perhaps this could be solved by carving away a bit more wood in this area to let the thumb rest more comfortably; though here I'm afraid I'm being a perfectionist, and it's a small detail that, unless you're looking for it, as I am, will surely go unnoticed. The headstock has a rosewood veneer with a piece of maple into which the maker's logo is inlaid, another aesthetic success on Alhambra's part. The ebony fingerboard has a uniform color, the frets are well installed and their ends well finished, with no sharp edges to scrape your hand as you slide it along the neck.

Finish, tuners, nut and saddle
The guitar has a gloss finish, which is properly applied and doesn't appear to be too thick, another factor that helps improve the response of acoustic instruments. I don't know the brand of the tuners, but they do their job perfectly and are in keeping with the instrument's overall look. The top of the nut and the bridge saddle have the same curvature as the fingerboard, which gives the strings a proportional height above it. They're made of a quality synthetic material, an option preferred by many builders as an alternative to traditional bone, and which in many cases gives better results than bone, especially when working with piezoelectric and similar pickup systems.

Feel and sound
As I mentioned, the neck feels very similar to that of an acoustic or electric guitar, but the action comes set a little high from the factory, measuring 3.8 mm on the sixth string and 2.8 mm on the first. Measuring from the top of the 12th fret to the bottom of the string, this height could be lowered by almost a millimeter without any problem, and even a bit more if you don't use a pick or do very aggressive strumming; likewise, the string height at the nut could also be lowered.

The "unplugged" sound has already been discussed in the section on the top, so I'll go straight to how it sounds through the Fishman system—in this case, the Prefix Problend model, which combines a microphone with an under-saddle pickup. For the bridge pickup, Fishman doesn't use the traditional piezoelectric system, which picks up vibrations only through the saddle and the pressure it exerts on it; instead it uses a system developed by the company that picks up the vibrations of the saddle and of the soundboard through the bridge along the entire length of the pickup, resulting in a more natural response. The microphone is mounted on the preamp chassis and, used in moderation, combined with the bridge pickup, it lets you add even more naturalness to the sound. First of all, I should mention that Fishman's user manual includes several ideas for setting the preamp's controls, and they're a great help as a starting point for fine-tuning them more precisely.

After setting the EQ flat on my usual amp, I start by making some preliminary adjustments on the preamp, just as the manufacturer recommends, and setting the amp's volume slightly louder than the guitar's acoustic volume. From there, I move on to finer adjustments, basically by ear. To do this, I put the guitar on a stand, with the instrument on my right and the amp on my left; all adjustments are made with the Fishman preamp's controls, leaving the amp's EQ flat. First I try the open strings and then move up, note by note, along the fingerboard, using a mechanical capo. With the "blend" control I mix the pickup and microphone signals until I reach a ratio of roughly 60/40%; with the "notch" and "phase" controls I keep feedback and unwanted resonances in check.

When I sense that the sound reaching my right ear is similar to what reaches my left, I decide it's time to pick up the phone and call a guitarist friend so I can get a more objective perception and compare mine with his.

After trying different styles, techniques and small readjustments on the preamp, we managed to reproduce the guitar's sound through the Fishman system, if not identically, then very closely. This EQ method is highly recommended, because it helps us internalize the sound of the instrument and know what we want to hear, regardless of the amplification system we use, as long as it has a minimum of quality; we can improve it even further if we have a good EQ and signal processors. Pop, jazz, bossa and fusion styles in general are very well received by the Cross Over; there's no doubt this guitar will also be of special interest to singer-songwriters. With a pick, with fingers, or a combination of both, you can get very rewarding tones. For my taste, it sounded best played with the fingers and a bit of nail, since the sound was warm yet defined. This is an ideal instrument for any electric or acoustic guitarist interested in the timbre of nylon strings, since their right-hand technique will hardly be affected, thanks to the neck and fingerboard dimensions, and it will surely lead them to explore other territories. As for me, I've already pulled a bossa nova DVD method and a fingerstyle jazz book out of the closet. Christmas is coming and, honestly, I've been very good this year.

12/16/2007