Tucked away in a small town in Central Oregon, Jason Chinchen, the teacher of one of the country’s only high school guitar luthier programs, begins class.

“Gather round, guitar builders!” Chinchen calls, projecting his voice over top of whirring woodshop machinery. Around fifteen students huddle in the center of the large yellow-walled shop at Sisters High School, prepared to receive the day’s instruction before they begin their work. Today’s demonstration: back bracing, placement and gluing.

A luthier is a person who builds or repairs string instruments, like violins or guitars. And guitar building, specifically, “is often considered the pinnacle of woodworking,” Chinchen explained.

Chinchen, who is now in his fifth year leading the high school luthier program, is a highly skilled luthier and woodworker in his own right. He set his sights on guitar building at an early age.

“I remember looking inside my dad’s guitar when I was a kid and being like, oh I see how this is made, I can make one of these” Chinchen remembered, “And I sort of set that goal for myself when I was quite young.”

But his journey to becoming a teacher was a more unexpected one.

“I had never taught, and I didn’t think that I could even be a teacher because I didn’t have the credentials for it,” Chinchen said. “And, it turns out, career and technical educators don’t need a teaching degree. So, I applied for the job and I was one of only two applicants and with a very specific set of skills ranging from CAD design and CNC work all the way to guitar making and construction… so, here I am."

The low number of qualified applicants is reflective of the specialness of the program itself, which began in 2005 under then teacher Tony Cosby.

“[He] was looking for a way to sort of bring the woods program here up a notch and was aware of Breedlove Guitar Company…” Chinchen explained, “so he got together with Jayson Bowerman, who was one of the earliest craftspeople at Breedlove… they brought a lot of the same processes that were there at Breedlove here and set up a shop here to build guitars.”

Launching the program was a community effort.

In addition to working with Bowerman, Cosby teamed up with the Sisters School District and the Sisters Folk Festival (now known as the arts nonprofit, SFF Presents) to get the program off the ground. Today, Breedlove Guitars and SFF Presents continue to collaborate with the Sisters School District to support the Luthier Program.

And the high school luthiers have been building around 30 guitars a year ever since.

“I haven’t done the math,” Chinchen said, “but Cosby used to say it was around 4 or 500 guitars that he’d built here with students, and that was before I came on 5 years ago.”

Each part of every guitar that is produced in the program is custom built by a student luthier — from body to fingerboard to headstock.

A few of the students, like Brennan Frutos, are already musicians. Frutos plays guitar at his church, and in a band with his friends. Last year, he made an acoustic guitar, and this year he’s building a custom electric guitar.

“With the acoustic, it’s a lot more like hands-on work,” explained Frutos, “whereas this one’s a lot more on the computer.”

“It’s a lot of fun getting to play a guitar that I made,” said Frutos, “I get a lot of questions about where I got the guitar, and it’s fun being able to tell people that I made it myself.”

But many of the students are looking forward to learning how to play the guitar, on an instrument they built.

“I know a couple of chords on the guitar, but not too much,” said senior Norah Thorsett. “I’m hoping to get into it more once this is built.”

“I don’t play much guitar,” said senior Grace Fendall, “My sister and my dad play guitar, and our family is a big music family. I personally don’t have my own guitar, so being in this program is really exciting because I’ll have my own guitar, and then I can work with my family, and they can show me how to play.”

The woodshop itself can feel like a sanctuary for students.

“It’s so important to have a program like this because it gives students another aspect of life and another way for them to see themselves, a different place where they can be good at something or be learning something new,” Chinchen said.

“They’re in here building a guitar and struggling to build a guitar just like everyone else in the room is struggling to build a guitar and it’s sort of like an equalizing place too in that way.”

“It’s definitely taught me to be more patient,” Thorsett said, “I’m kind of more of like a go-go-go person… and it’s really just taught me to slow down, enjoy the process, you’re going to look back at it and be like wow, I handmade this, and it’s all from the heart.”

“Chinchen’s been really supportive, and it feels kind of like a family kind of system here. So yeah, I love it here,” Fendall said.

“I have students all the time that come in here and may not feel comfortable just walking down the hall to get here, but when they come into this room, they’ve had wins,” Chinchen said.

“Or, if they haven’t yet, I love when that aha moment happens for a student and… they just light up and then all of a sudden they’re an expert and they’re helping the next student in line.”

And even though the students are building a guitar in the class, it’s not necessarily the most important lesson they’re walking away with.

“I think showing my students that you could be a human in this room is one of my most important lessons,” Chinchen said. “I have a lot of grief about our world right now, and I’m sure I’m not alone in that. So, every chance I get to encourage love and understanding, I try to do that.”

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/02/10/sisters-oregon-high-school-luthiers-build-custom-acoustic-guitars/