Luthiers School of Amazonas

Many programs train children and youth in arts and crafts, but the Luthier’s School is the only one that works with musical instruments. The School is a guitar workshop of the highest quality, teaching street children and juvenile delinquents a job that will bring them a good salary.

Rubens Gomes, the founder of the school, is a professional luthier (guitar maker), and not a social worker. He began to work with marginalized children in the remote state of Acre (on the border with Perú), where he gave workshops on music and self esteem in juvenile detention centers. He learned that he had a real calling to work with teenagers, so when he moved to Manaus, he founded the Luthier’s School.

The School functions much like the old apprentice system. 14-18 year olds come to the workshop to learn the basics of the art: how to chose good wood, how to cut it, how to warp and seal it, how to decorate the body and tune the strings. During this first stage, the most experienced students teach their younger peers.

After learning how to make a guitar by hand, the apprentices move on to an industrial workshop, where a Cuban master luthier has transformed common machine tools into a guitar factory. Here, the students learn industrial production, management, and marketing. The first class is now ready to graduate, and the School will help them establish a professional coop.

Because they are in Manaus, the student luthiers cannot use the traditional woods for guitar making; instead, they have found native Amazon woods that work just as well. The School makes sure that all its lumber comes from sustainable forests with well paid lumberjacks, because it wants its work to serve as a model for a just, sustainable economy. All of the students learn about the environment; they then teach their peers and the guitar buyers about the importance of ecology.

Traditionally only men have been luthiers, so the School is proud to have trained the first two female guitar-makers in Brasil. Gender and equality are important issues for the school.

Beyond its impact on the youth who study at the School, the School has made a difference in the life of the community (the School is located in a poor neighborhood). Today, children in the community have new role models, and they can imagine a life other than that of the gangster or drug dealer.

Oficina Escola de Lutheria da Amazônia
Rua 22, quadra O Casa 08
Conjunto São Cristovão, Zumbi II, Manaus, AM 69084 580
Brasil

92 644 5459 o 638 2667

Contacto: Rubens Gomes, Coordinador, rubensgomes@oela.org.br

www.oela.org.br