Wolfgang Jellinghaus was born in 1951 in Dortmund, Germany. The son of Walter Jellinghaus, a maker of guitars and zither -guitars, Wolfgang learned to make guitars under his father's guidance.  In 1978, he opened Musik Jellinghaus GmbH and in 1983, created Martinez Guitars. Fast forward, in 2003 in partnership with Kenny Hill and Alex Wang, Wolfgang helped set up the Martinez guitar factory in China. In 2013, Wolfgang sold Musik Jellinghaus GmbH, and set up Milestones of Music in China, a small boutique traditional workshop dedicated to building a line of custom guitars designed to capture the essence of maker's like Lacote, Torres, Hauser, Ramirez among others whose instruments set milestones in the history of the guitar, but also seeks to offer innovative designs that will set new milestones for the guitar. The Milestone of Music workshop is set up very much like the José Ramirez shop was during the early 1960s. It employees nine people: five luthiers, one assistant doing rough work, and two French polishers, and an administrator. Wolfgang designs guitars, oversees production, buys and selects woods, and not least helps market them.v

This guitar is his tribute to Jose Ramirez III (Madrid 1922-1995) whose guitars Segovia played from 1960 to his death in in 1987.  Just as his great uncle Manuel Ramirez (who gave Segovia a guitar in 1912 that he played for 25 years), and just had done, and dshis grandfather Jose Ramirez Is  had done at the turn of the 20th century—which assembled and trained the luthiers that defined the Madrid School. Between the 1960s to the 1990s, Jose Ramirez III likewise assembled and trained many of the most talented guitarreros of his generation, including Paulino Bernabé, Manuel Contreras, Felix Manzanero, Manuel Caceras, Mariano Tezanos,  Miguel Malo, Carmello ālerena, Jose Romero, Arturo Sanzano, among many.  The model Espanola is a tribute to Jose Ramirez III, and uses the bracing system that Ramirez developed. I brought this guitar directly from Wolfgang at the end of the NAMM show. As one might guess, makers generally bring the best examples of their work to this show, and this guitar is a superb example of his work.