We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Maria Surratt. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Maria below.

Alright, Maria thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

Growing up, I watched my parents live the life they wanted to live. They structured their work around their lifestyles and desires rather than trying to fit their dreams into the corners around work. I well remember the smell of the wood shop while skating circles around all the different tools and sawdust piles as well as the taste of sunflower seeds sneaked from the bird feeder while helping mom in the gardens.

As life took its course and I was blessed with a family of my own I realized I couldn’t simply ignore my children, my home and the property I was blessed with to find a job that would take care of the needs. I needed ways to let my creative juices flow and worked to find those while homeschooling my children and living life.

My dad began an acoustic guitar building business in his retirement and though I loved his work, I didn’t know how I could be a part of it with all the other things on my table. In 2020, while many of us were spending more hours at home, my 8 year old son kept disappearing to Papa’s shop next door. He said he was making a ukulele. I dismissed him thinking he was playing with scrap wood and just enjoying his grandpa’s shop, until two weeks later when he walked in the back door holding a beautiful hand made real ukulele! “Look what I made!” That put a jealous fire in his siblings hearts and it wasn’t long until his older sister and brother also walked through the door proudly displaying their hand made ukuleles. Well! If the kids could build these beautiful instruments, it was time I try too! I had made a few furniture items over the years but this would be a first at this level of engagement.

There is great sense of accomplishment and joy to finish a project that takes seventy plus hours of blood sweat and tears. After that first build I was already planning future builds in my mind. A couple years later I built another and then life took some changes for me and I needed to find work that could support my family in a greater way. By this time, Dad’s business was in need of an office manager and our two needs joined forces and found a good fit. I couldn’t simply stay in the office however. The shop was calling my name. Dad is a great teacher as well as a craftsman. He has helped approximately 20 students build their own guitars. He has built over 170 guitars and every one of them is a treasured instrument.

Recently, I finished my fourth guitar and I am happy with the way it turned out. Each guitar I have the pleasure of building increases my knowledge and skill, and this guitar holds a lot of meaning and pride for me. As dad and I currently work together to provide the world with hand crafted instruments built with locally sourced tone woods from the Shenandoah Valley, I delight in the opportunity to use the talents and creative gifts God has given while taking care of the family he has also blessed me with.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Showalter Guitars was birthed out of a desire for a meaningful retirement for Stephen Showalter. Always a hard worker, with a love for wood working and building, Stephen built his first piece of furniture out of need for a baby cradle for his first daughter. That piece became the starting point of a fine wood working business that led to clock making. As the family grew, a need for more immediate cash flow switched Stephen’s primary building ventures from wood to brick and block masonry.

In 1981, Stephen decided he would like to learn to play guitar, but he didn’t have one to practice on. Much like he did for anything else he needed, he decided instead of looking elsewhere to buy one, he’d just build one in his shop. Building that first 6-string led to building a 12-string. Again, family necessity put wood working on the back burner until about 2011. At this time the family was grown and flown and the masonry business was hard on the body. Stephen was ready to retire.

Retirement for Stephen couldn’t simply be leaning back in an easy chair however! Stephen figured since he had run the masonry business for 30 years, and was now only 62, he had time for a another 30 year business if he put his mind to it. Showalter Guitars began.

Over the years, Stephen has taken his love for creating and his knowledge of craftsmanship to build over 170 unique guitars for individual clients from beginners to experienced music artists. He specializes in using local wood that he mills himself at his shop in the Shenandoah Valley, VA.

Showalter Guitars come in many different shapes and sizes and are built with a variety of woods and finishings according to a customers desire. One thing that sets a Showalter Guitar apart from nearly any other guitar you will find in the world is Stephen’s use of Sycamore as a top wood. Experimenting with different woods has always been a joy for Stephen. Finding Sycamore to work up similar to the popular Spruce that is used for most guitar tops, Stephen decided to use it and found that a perfectly quarter sawn Sycamore top not only sounds even better than Spruce but looks far more unique and beautiful in it’s presentation. Showalter Guitars will use traditional timbers like Spruce tops and exotic woods if a customer requests these options, but he generally prefers to work with tone woods he can locally source. This also keeps the cost of our instruments in a range that more people can consider. Anyone who is a guitar connoisseur that spends some time in our shop, finds Showalter Guitars to present a sound that rivals any other well known guitar names and a look that sets them apart as uniquely from the Shenandoah Valley.

A budding musician can begin their musical career with a guitar from anywhere, but if you want a guitar that will create a musician out of you, a guitar to grow old with, something to treasure and pass down as a legacy piece, it’s time to pay Showalter Guitars a visit.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

In our fast paced, get it cheap and easy society, we often don’t see the value of hard work, talent and creativity. When a robot can produce something that does the job faster and in mass quantity, we may find it hard to understand the price tag that comes with real art and hand made products.

When this happens we fail to remember that we are created by and in the image of a creative God who designed and formed the universe and each and every plant and animal for our enjoyment. If we take the time to really look at Creation, we find unique form and individual expression in each piece of nature, every animal and certainly in each human being. No two are alike. This is the value and delight of art and hand made items. Creatives take the time, the effort, the ingenuity to create unique and lovely pieces that can not be exactly replicated, ever. When something is one of a kind, it’s value sky rockets. To treasure an instrument or another artwork that not only has practical use but also boasts a unique beauty is something worth investing in.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I’ll answer this as Maria…

As a mom of six kids, and one who has worked with many groups of children and adults, I look around and see passion as the driving force of life. If we don’t have something to live for, we don’t live. I believe each and every human being was created for a purpose and has a reason to be on this earth. In our comfortable and easy society it’s pretty easy to forget that and just sit back and melt into a couch numbing our minds with endless hours of scrolling and eating premade junk food that came in a package.

If we can find something to do that fills our days with meaning and accomplishment, it motivates us to enjoy the life we live and even calls us to make life better for other people. I find great joy in music and creating. In order to create good music, we need good instruments and to create in general we need training, practice and then some source for outflow. Working with Showalter Guitars combines all these passions for me. If I can exemplify to my children that I can pick up a new skill (woodworking) learn from the previous generation (training) and create something of value (an instrument) that brings value to other people (music) and can even be used for worship of our Creator, this is a motivating power for them to work toward something of value as well. If my instruments can make learning music easier and more comfortable, accessible and beautiful for others, this is an all around win win situation. As a musician myself, I know the difference between a good instrument and one that just makes noise. It is my hope to not just add noise and stuff to this earth, but to release a pleasing sound and artful music throughout the universe.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ShowalterGuitars.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/showalterguitars/?hl=en
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShowalterGuitars/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@showalterguitars