Classical guitar composers wrote mostly in tablature notation. In the middle of the 16th century, influences from the vihuela and the renaissance guitar were combined and the baroque five string guitar appeared in Spain. The baroque guitar quickly superseded the vihuela in popularity in Spain, France and Italy and Italian players and composers became prominent. In the late 18th century the six string guitar quickly became popular at the expense of the five string guitars. During the 19th century the Spanish luthier and player Antonio de Torres gave the modern classical guitar its definitive form, with a broadened body, increased waist curve,
Ten-string classical guitar of Yepes Ramírez III considered adding sympathetic strings to the classical guitar. He sought advice from the leading classical guitarists of the time, notably Andrés Segovia and Narciso Yepes, both of them players of Ramírez six-string guitars. Eventually they came up with a ten-string guitar. In "Ser Instrumento", Yepes mentions that the reasons that led him to carry out the "design" ("diseño"), of his instrument were acoustical/physical (""físicas"") and musical (""musicales""). After some "initial protest" that the 10-string guitar envisioned by Yepes was "impossible" to construct, Ramírez agreed to the commission and completed the first of these instruments in March 1964. Yepes