I know it's probably a stupid question. I know they both have wide necks and nylon strings,but that's about my limit. I would like to get a Cordoba classical,one of the good ones as my next purchase.When I look at them online,both of the guitars look alike to me. I heard that the classsical was more durable,but I just want to know the difference.
The flamenco has much lower action because of the percussive style, there is also guard of sort around the sound hole because of the style as well.
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Those guards Gchord mentioned are called golpeadores (tap plates). The other big difference is the wood: flamenco guitars are traditionally made of Spanish cypress. Classical guitars are usually topped with spruce or cedar, and usually have rosewood or mahogany backs and sides.
Traditionally, the tuners on flamenco guitars were tuning pegs (like on a violin). But classical guitar tuners - roller tuners through a slotted peghead - have become much more common in the last 25 years or so.
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Sometimes the body of the flamenco guitars is smaller (but just a little bit) and the shape is also different.
Another wood that is used on some of the less expensive flamencos are Sycamore. As far as classicals being more durable than flamencos - I don't believe that. I mean if you watch some flamenco players, becuase of the percussive playing style, they really put their guitars through some punishment, slapping and hitting the top lik a drum at times! This is the reason for the tap plates (golpeadores). Don't limit your guitar search to just classicals only, there are some very nice and similar playing flamencos out there, especially in the Cordoba price range ($500 ~ $1500). I owned a Yamaha flamenco that just played and sounded better than some of the classicals in the same price range so I bought that and used it for both spanish and classical music. I think once you start to get up into the hand made flamencos ($4000 ~ up) will you notice the more "traditional" dry, less sustain, flamenco sound. Play them both and get what your hands and ears like better.
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The top will be thinner, too.
We played a Spanish night last year and "Los Palomas" - a local flamenco group - came along. I had a feel of the guitar their chap had brought along, it was extremely light and you could almost see the top bending when you pressed it
A :-)
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