"The Greatest Guitar of Our Era"
In 1916 Andres Segovia came to the Manuel Ramirez shop hoping to rent a concert guitar for his upcoming recital in Madrid. Upon hearing Andres bring out the glorious tones from the guitar,Manuel offered the instrument as a gift telling Segovia "Go out in to the world and make my works better known by your marvelous playing" In 1924 the gift from Manuel was in need of repair but Manuel was dead 7 years by then and Segovia went to the Santos Hernandez shop at Aduana 23 in Madrid. Whereupon Andres was to learn all this time that the guitar had been made by Santos himself - Santos being the foreman of Manuel's shop at the time.
 
Santos wanted to put his own label on the guitar and Andres refused saying only "Put a label inside that states you repaired it." To which Santos replied "My initials SH are to the right of center to identify that I made it though the label says Manuel Ramirez." This was the instrument that Andres Segovia was to begin his glorious recording career just 3 years later in 1927.
 
He recorded 20 songs on this instrument until in 1937 Andres began to use a Herman Hauser I guitar. Hauser took every opportunity to measure this 1912 Manuel Ramirez by Santos when Segovia would be concertizing in Germany. This viewing of the 1912 Santos went on from about 1923 -1936, but Hauser also took in to account his occasional viewing of Miguel Llobet's 1860 Antonio de Torres. So the "greatest guitar of our epoch" to quote Segovia was a
combination of a Santos and a Torres.
 
Santos Hernandez was born on November 1, l874. At the age of 10 he was an apprentice in a shop that made clothes for the Catholic clergy. Then at the age of 12, he began working in the guitar shop of Valentin Viudes Jr. Somewhat shortly after he was working in the Ortega shop,following his continued apprenticeship in the taller of the Sons of Gonzales (whose father was Maestro to Jose Ramirez I starting in l870).
 
In l893 he entered military service (artillery). After a stint of 2 1/2 - 5 years, depending on the source of information , he entered the taller of Manuel Ramirez in 1898. He stayed there intil Manuel's death in l917. In l912 he built an 11 string classical for Antonio Gimenez Manjon. Manjon offered Manuel Ramirez substantially less for the guitar though it was a special order. Manuel was disgusted with Manjon's ridiculous offer and the guitar remained unsold. Somewhere between the time it was originally constructed and 1916 it was converted back to a 6 string (not being a lot of buyers for 11 string models that one can play J. S. Bach compositions at original pitch).
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