Katoh MCG-20 Review - Budget Classical Guitar Review

Which Student Classical Guitar is Easiest to Play & Produces the Superior Sound for New Students?

Katoh MCG-20 classical guitar review

The Katoh MCG-20 is a popular beginner’s guitar for students who are just getting started with classical guitar.

In this Katoh MCG-20 article, we will look at and review the Katoh MCG-20 classical guitar and the GuitarsOnline range of student classical guitars, discuss and compare them, to see which is the better option for students getting started with classical guitar.

Quick Overview

Katoh MCG-20 - Beginners Guitar

Price: $349 (RRP) - on sale $289
Resale/Second-hand Price: approx $200 (after 12 months)
Country of Manufacture: China (outsourced to same factory as Cordoba)
Tonewoods: Laminated spruce top with sapele back and sides.

What GuitarsOnline have to say:

The Katoh MCG-20 is a well priced beginners guitar and offers good ease of playing.

Looks shiny on the store shelf. But all that lacquer comes at costs. The use of a laminated Spruce Soundboard as opposed to solid wood and heavily applied lacquer on the top result in a guitar lacking generous tonality and projection sounding muffled and somewhat boxy.

For the money you can probably do better.

The downside of these lowest price guitars, is that they are made with a laminated (plywood) top, which means it is hard to make quality music on a poor quality guitar.

In our experience, the more practised teachers often steer students away from these laminated top guitars, as they lack quality of tone, responsiveness and have poor volume and projection.

It’s important to remember, that as a student starting out with your first classical guitar, the wrong guitar can damage your love of the instrument forever.

Therefore, it’s important that you understand there is a big difference between cheap and inexpensive. Cheap guitars are typically cheap for a reason - poor quality means poor quality sound. However a good quality, inexpensive guitar, gives you the chance to start strong as you further develop your skills, experience and playing ability.

Quick Overview - GuitarsOnline Range of Student Classical Guitars

Antonio Pinto GC200 - $290 (our recommended alternative)
Oregon Spruce top, with markers 3,5,7 to make playing easier for beginners, Spanish heel construction, full sound.

Antonio Pinto 1C Open Pore - $399
Good solid Cedar or Spruce top, markers 3, 5, 7 to make playing easier for beginners, Warm tonality, detail in every note, excellent value for money.

Alhambra College Spruce - $488
Alhambra entry level guitar, easy to play with good Solid Spruce top, good value.

APC Koa Koa Open Pore Classical - $499
Exotic Koa tone woods, projection, striking matte finish.

Alhambra College Cedar - $540
Alhambra entry level, easy to play and great balance across the strings.

Antonio Pinto 1C High Gloss - $599
Higher grade Solid Cedar top, balance and resonant, more detail in each note and due to lacquering greater resonance.

Guitar Construction - Comparing Laminated Top to Solid Top Construction

Laminated Top Guitars (eg Katoh MCG-20 + Yamaha C40) vs Solid Top Guitars (the GuitarsOnline Student Range)

Laminated top guitars such as the Katoh MCG-20 and the Yamaha C40 are both popular beginner guitars, offered at very low prices.

These guitars all offer good ease of playing, but as they all have laminated tops, teachers often steer students away from these, as they lack quality of tone, responsiveness and volume and projection.

But what is the difference between laminated top guitars and solid top guitars and does it make any difference to the music they produce?

As a student starting out with your first classical guitar, the wrong guitar can damage your love of the instrument forever. Therefore, it’s important that you keep a few things in mind.

Remember there is a big difference between cheap and inexpensive.

Cheap guitars are typically cheap for a reason - poor quality means poor quality sound. However a good quality, inexpensive guitar, gives you the chance to start strong as you further develop your skills, experience and playing ability.

The neck, fretboard and body of a classical guitar can be made of different woods, each one complementing the other - but for an entry level guitar, the most important component of the guitar is the top (or the soundboard).

It’s where the bracing and the soundhole are placed, which both help to shape the sound of your instrument. The top is one of your guitar’s first points of contact with the strings, as the vibration of the strings reaches the rest of the guitar via the top wood.

A solid top guitar, is where the top of the guitar is made from a single piece of wood, such as cedar or spruce. This piece of wood has been carefully picked, carved, shaped and fitted, but remains a single piece – from source to instrument.

A laminated top guitar, is where the guitar top is made of multiple pieces of wood, where these much thinner layers are joined together using a combination of heat, pressure and adhesives and is a much cheaper form of manufacture.

While the visible wood on the top may be say cedar, because you can’t see what’s underneath the top layer, the rest of the laminated top could be anything from plywood to plastic resin.

Summary: Playability and quality of tone rich resonance.

To make music you need a solid top guitar (Cedar or Spruce) - It is hard to make music on a laminate or plywood guitar.

A solid top in a guitar is critical, because the solid top is the engine of the guitar. Unless the maker specifies it is solid Cedar/Spruce, it will almost certainly be laminated, resulting in poor quality of tone, a lack of responsiveness and unsatisfactory volume and projection.

How do Katoh Manufacture Their Katoh MCG-20 Guitars?

The goal of the lowest priced guitar makers, is to have their guitars manufactured as cheaply as possible.

Katoh achieve this by focusing on the branding and the marketing and outsourcing the manufacture of their guitars to an independent factory in China. The same independent factory that makes the Cordoba guitars.

The advantage of outsourcing the manufacturing to a factory in China, is that you can have the guitars made very cheaply, but there is also a significant downside. With the variability of tonewoods and skill level, because building classical guitars is an artisan craft, when you adopt a high-volume production line approach to a craftsman built instrument , you can quickly have problems with product and musical quality.

Our Recommended GuitarsOnline Alternative

Antonio Pinto Carvalho GC200 RRP $290 on sale $260

FEATURES

  • Made in Portugal

  • Superior Spanish heel join

  • The finish is eco which makes enables a warm, open, resonating playing from the first note

  • Level – Student study

  • Scale options – 650, 636 (7/8 Senorita) 3/4, 1/2 Sizes

  • Top – Oregon spruce

  • Neck - Samaguila

  • Back and Sides – Sapelli

  • Varnish - Open pore

  • Machine heads – Silver

GC200 Overview
Beginner guitar with Oregon spruce for the top and back and side made of Sapelli. Open pore varnish. It has marker points on frets 3, 5 and 7 to make it easier for the beginner to take the first steps into guitar playing.

 This is the Guitarsonline entry level model featuring a high-quality Oregon Spruce top, ideal for entry level serious players. It’s construction and finish are commensurate with those of much more expensive models.

Although it is slightly more than some of its imitators and it is an entry level Antonio Pinto guitar, don’t let this fool you because we have selected this guitar and inspected every aspect of its build to stand up and deliver.

We are impressed by the value they have managed to pack into this great beginner guitar and by the clarity of its sound and its easy playability.

Also, you might also want to compare these other value for money options:

Solid top Antonio Pinto PC 1C in both Cedar and Spruce offering a solid top and better sound due to solid top for $399-10% -$359 and you have a choice of solid Spruce or Cedar and the superior Spanish heel join.
The finish is eco which makes enables a warm, open, resonating playing from the first note.
These are made with Spanish heel construction, a superior method that lets the guitar vibrate as a one-piece whole.

Notes on the maker - Antonio Pinto Carvalho

This is a small artisan maker with his own name and reputation on the line and entering now the second and third generation - so this is not a made up brand or non-existent maker. I was attracted to these guitars as the handcrafted instruments of Antonio Pinto Carvalho made in Portugal enjoy a high reputation for its careful construction and good woods. The man is exacting, a ball of energy and a walking encyclopedia of all things guitar. The second generation has been trained in the same painstaking work ethic.

Luthiers for GuitarsOnline Range of Student Guitars

The Luthier - António Pinto Carvalho

A craftsman with more than 50 years of experience and one of the most well known Luthiers in Portugal.

António Pinto Carvalho is the mentor and founder of the company. He started learning his craft in 1961, in his grandfather’s workshop.

His luthier skills were passed on to him by his grandfather, which gained that knowledge from the Porto’s 20th century “Ancient school of guitar makers”. After losing his father at the age of 10, Antonio started working in the world of stringed instruments manufacture, and since then he has never stopped.

In 1976 António Pinto de Carvalho founded the company “António Pinto Carvalho” and today, is a craftsman with more than 50 years of experience and one of the most well known Luthiers in Portugal.

With about 50 employees, APC Instruments Musicais is not only the largest Portuguese company in the field, but one of the largest in Europe, producing and distributing a wide variety of instruments throughout the world. 

The company does not forget the touch of each “luthier” on each instrument, making each piece a work of unique beauty and sound.

The symbiosis between the manual art brought from the 19th century and the technology of today is, therefore, the key to the quality and authenticity of each instrument.

The Luthier - Alhambra
Since 1965, Alhambra Guitars bring the everlasting allure of Spain's heritage to the fingertips of guitar players, unlocking an endless wellspring of inspiration. Over 55 years Alhambra Guitars has been dedicated to perfecting the art of guitar construction. 

Our family of 110 skilled workers, each with a deep-rooted passion for crafting stringed instruments, forms the heart and soul of our company. With generations of expertise passed down through the tradition and knowledge of refined guitar building, we take immense pride in preserving our heritage while embracing innovation.

The foundation of our exceptional instruments lies in the selection of the finest raw materials. We meticulously source fine woods like cedar, spruce, rosewood, ebony, and cypress from their places of origin, ensuring the highest quality for our guitars. Once at our factory, the wood undergoes a natural drying process, expertly stabilized through cutting-edge technology, to guarantee optimal performance.

Our process involves the careful creation and assembly of each guitar piece, followed by precise varnishing and polishing. We believe that every instrument is unique, deserving individual attention, tuning, and sound control to achieve its full potential.

The quality and reliability of our musical instruments are paramount to us. Alhambra Guitars implements a comprehensive production process control system, starting with the selection of the best raw materials. This unwavering commitment to quality extends to our customers through a three-year guarantee and meticulous after-sales service.

Our guitars are widely recognized and celebrated for their exceptional quality, design, and sonority. The superb sound we achieve is a result of the professionalism of our artisans, their meticulous working methods, and the careful selection of woods, particularly the use of solid cedar and spruce tops.

The GuitarsOnline “Best of Breed” Strategy for Selecting Our Range of Student Classical Guitars

I grew up in Spain around guitars and have been travelling and buying guitars and importing into Australia for over 20 years.

Finding good entry level, value for money student  guitars, with beautiful tone and great playability is the hardest thing to do.

The reasons for this are that the major costs in guitar building are the increasingly costs of quality tone woods, the time consuming process of guitar building and the cost of really good guitar makers as opposed to wood-workers.

Any shortcuts taken in material, hours and quality building can then be heard in every note for years to come and will make the guitar hard to play. And let’s face it as a beginner you need all the help you can get!

To overcome these barriers while implementing strict quality control is essential.

In my 20+ years of classical guitar evaluating, testing and buying experience, I’ve found the most successful strategy for selecting our student guitar range, is what I call our “best-of-breed” strategy.

This strategy involves visiting every luthier in their workshop and evaluating and testing and then selecting the “best of breed” guitars for our range, that fit into the budget of the average student level guitarist.  

How Our “Best-of-Breed” Range Selection Strategy Works

The biggest challenge with identifying and selecting guitars for our range, especially at the student/entry level, is that classical guitars are a “artisanal product”.

The variability of materials, tonewoods and manufacturing standards, means that you can’t approach guitar production with the same standardised product manufacturing process as you do with say electronics, technology or even furniture.

This creates a huge challenge for music stores, who purchase and import their guitars “unseen” and untested”

Given this variability it always struck me as odd that none of the other importers play classical or flamenco guitar, or travel and test their guitars before selling them here.

They just import ‘XYZ brand’ from a catalogue and treat it as a product like a paperclip! 

Our “best of breed strategy” means more work for me, but it has been proven year-on-year, to be the most effective way to source high-quality, easy to play classical guitars at cost-effective prices.

By travelling to Spain to visit with the makers, inspect their guitars and then place orders. I’m able to identify the standout “best of breed” guitars at all different price points and construction methods - and then put them into player’s hands.

For more information or if you have any questions, or if you would like to arrange an appointment to test-drive our range of guitars, please contact:
Pierre  Herrero
m: 0410 708 338
pierre@guitarsonline.com.au