I've been thinking more and more about people and their relationships with their guitars (and their guitar-adjacent instruments), and what happens when those relationships break up. Or more specifically, when guitars get broken, and those broken guitars break hearts.

There are different kinds of guitar breakage. Sometimes breaking a guitar is the thing ya gotta do to make a point. Then again, sometimes guitars break when you don't want them to break.

This one runs from the ancient suburbs of Cairo to the stages of London, Leeds, and the Monterey Pop Festival. I also explore a work by the artist Christian Marclay, who destroyed a guitar to tell a heartbreaking story.

And I couldn't help adding four stories of guitars that broke my own heart.

All of that in under 30 minutes? I'm dedicated to making the most of your podcast listening time, and you're welcome.

If YOU have any stories of broken guitars that broke your heart (or guitars you broke to make a point) I want to hear them. Tell that story to your phone, send that audio file to me at aphotguitar@gmail.com, and with your permission I'll include them in future episodes.

I like this one. I hope you do, too.

Support the project here!

This episode is about Lutes.

Not the Lute we know, but the Lutes we call Lutes that aren't the Lute we know, which came before the Lute we know, which is a Lute that led to the guitar...which is also a Lute. The episode spans a couple of thousand years, and thousands of miles, to paint a picture of ancestors of the guitar that were common among many ancient peoples, and which connected the musical cultures of the ancient middle east, the near east, and the far east, via the Silk Roads.

There's a little sex, and a pinch of violence, and I had a ridiculous amount of fun making this episode, which is part of the reason it took me so f++king long to produce. Enjoy, and learn something in the process.

Support the project here!

From The Lyres of Ur in episode 10, this episode takes us 1,000 years into the future, and 1,000 miles to the west of Mesopotamia, to ancient Egypt. Once we're there, we'll find a 3,500 year-old musical instrument, played by the in-house musician of the architect and polymath, Sen-en-Mut, who was in the employ of the first female Pharoah, Hat-Shepsut.

Sen-en-Mut's favorite musician was named Har-Mose. His instrument was a type of Lute, and it was buried at his side. This accident of history meant that this ancient, delicate instrument, made of wood and animal byproducts, survived the centuries, alongside the stone pyramids and temples of ancient Egypt.

The Lute of Har-Mose is the second-oldest extant string musical instrument in the world. The way it was designed, constructed, and played makes it a critical step in the long history of people and their guitars: it's not just a distant cousin of the guitar, it's almost a kind of prototype. It points us directly to the guitar, and the episodes to come, when we'll move through the ancient world and the Middle East, to North Africa and southern Europe, as we continue to follow the trail of the guitar's DNA and the cultures it helped to create.

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I'm always interested in direct feedback and ideas, so get in touch at aphotguitar@gmail.com.