Glenn Quarles, 2019 Galloup School Graduate
I’ve been doing woodworking my whole life and several years after retiring from the Air Force I decided to try to find a way to use my VA educational benefits doing something I really enjoyed. And even though I do not play guitars I have always appreciated the look and sound of a nice guitar. I thought it would be cool to learn how to build them and began searching for guitar-building schools that accept the VA benefits, after talking with Jean, I was signed up to start my first 2-month course about a year later.
After that first session of school was over I returned home to Texas and immediately started building all the tooling, fixtures, etc I needed to start building guitars in my own shop. By the time I returned to Galloup the next summer, I had completed the majority of the tooling I needed and finished my first “GQ” guitar. After returning home from the second term I began showing my guitar friends my new fingerstyle guitar I had built and immediately got my first order for a guitar. By the time I returned to Galloup the next summer, I already had a waiting list and it is still that way today!
I always take great pride in everything I do and my goal was and is to build the world’s best guitars. Now that is NOT in a conceited, factual kind of statement, it is only an ATTITUDE kind of statement that is directed at myself. Basically what I mean is that every day when I walk out to my shop I am going to do my absolute best! It also means that I am going to keep studying the art, keep asking questions to the builders I trust and constantly trying to improve my guitars.
I have been very blessed that a few of my guitars have been in the hands of some of the best acoustic guitar players in the world and I have several very popular musicians that play their GQs on some very big stages! The first time one of my instruments was played on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry was a very surreal moment! Now after probably 40 times on that same stage it still seems unreal!
Each of my guitars is custom-built for each customer. Each has its own inlay design and wood selection to mean something special to the customer. I have never built two guitars with the same design theme. This means many more hours are spent doing the design part of the build, which often adds many more hours to the construction part of the build. This, combined with the time my wife and I spend working with Samaritans Purse doing disaster work, means I only build about 4 guitars a year.
In this business where there are so many great guitar builders around the world, I felt there must be a niche where each of us fit. Early on, I knew that my guitars were only going to be built using Texas mesquites for the back and sides. I love working with mesquite and the rustic character can make for a very stunning instrument. Another thing I do a little differently is my carbon fiber composite side construction. The sides on my guitars are 3 layers (mesquite on the outside, another kind of wood in the middle, and carbon fiber on the inside) and are very stiff! Both of these “niches” combine to give a rich, strong tone to my guitars. Plus I really like the way they look!!