Tony Acosta of Luthier Music Corp. shares an undated photo he took with the late Spanish flamenco guitarist Paco de Lucía (left) and Argentine classical guitarist Jorge Morel (right), March 2016.

The fragrance of varnish and curing wood drifts by as you enter Side Door Strings, transporting you to an era when objects and the tools that built them were all made by hand.

Luthier Joel Thompson in his workshop, Side Door Strings. A luthier is a craftsperson who builds and repairs stringed instruments that are played with a bow or plucked.

The race to successfully fuse a guitar video game controller with a genuine musical instrument is over, with two publishers showing off peripherals at E3 that double as real guitars — strings, frets ...