Shelly Park

AndrewUlle

Any opinions on Shelly Park guitars, namely a 12 fret Elan? Dry / French sounding?

Charles Meadows

I ran across a used D hole in Nashville (Cotten Music). The strings were old. But I was not impressed. Did not have seems to have much of a Gypsy sound. More like a Taylor! But that's just me.

Scoredog

I think it depends on the Park, I have a favino style one that is quite nasely which is what it is supposed to be. It may depend on when it was made.

pickitjohn

If you can play it and you like it that's what counts.

Russell Letson

I've heard any number of Shelley's guitars on recordings and live and played a few. They sounded fine to me, though I'm less concerned than some about nuances of GJ guitar sounds--I've heard too much variation to think that the range is narrow. It's going to depend on the particular guitar, of course, and Shelley's been building for a while, so I wouldn't be surprised to find a fair range of sounds among her instruments.

(BTW, I've heard Taylors played in a GJ band context, and they didn't sound anything like the Parks in, say, Pearl Django.)

Scoredog

I'll vouch for my Park, sounds good and plays well, being a Favino size the tone is not relevant to your potential purchase so I won't post an example.

dennis

I haven't tried that many parks.. possibly a dozen or so, they all seemed fine to me. I actually really liked a few of them. Two guys, that I know, own parks that I really really really like, and I have even borrowed them when mine was unavailable.

Nonetheless, at the risk of hijacking the original topic of this thread, it's subjective as pickitjohn said.

This is a very interesting topic and one that i've been interested to write/talk about, but it's also very sensitive and potentially controversial.

At what point is it ok to talk negatively about a luthier in a public forum?

As someone who has met hundreds and hundreds of players in the style, and also tried tons of guitars, i'm aware of many stories that are rarely mentioned publicly. Stories that would make customers think twice before ordering a guitar from a well-known luthier.

People don't seem to mind criticizing the ultra famous luthiers, Dupont, Favino. Is it because they're the most famous and the least likely to be affected by negative reviews?

For most other lesser known but still reputable luthiers, the horror stories don't seem to exist!

In the end, I think it's about how a luthier treats his clients as well.

I know of one well known luthier who built a guitar for a friend of mine. After a few months, the guitar apparently had structural problems; my friend went to see him , and the luthier simply replied :"ya it happens". My friend asked the luthier to fix it, but he refused to do it for free. That is what my friend says anyway. I've seen this luthier's name mentioned here recently, but i've always kept this story to myself. I don't want people going to luthiers and saying "but denis chang said...". The original customers should be the ones sharing the story, not me , or any other second hand source.

I know another reputable luthier that has built good and great guitars, but has built a number (i'm aware of at least 4) guitars that had severe structural problems. The luthier was nice enough to take back a customer's guitar and offered to build him a brand new one. From a customer service point of view, that's excellent. But is it not a frustrating experience to have a custom built guitar only to find out it is severely flawed?

One of my first custom made guitars was botched from the beginning, and the luthier, instead of restarting the guitar from scratch, decided to just work around the mistake. I only became aware of it when i sold the guitar to a student and he fell on it; he took it to a local luthier who noticed the mess-up. In other words, the original luthier never even mentioned to me, yet i paid full price.

The guitars with severe structural problems are not apparent right away. It takes a while for this to happen, generally a few months in. Which is why, over the years, i ve met amateur/hobbyist luthiers make claims that they've cracked the secret and that all reputable luthiers are doing it wrong. They basically make a guitar with ultra thin top, and bracing. Out of the box, they sound amazing indeed, but after a few months, the tops just cave in totally.

You simply cannot properly judge a brand new guitar. And on public forums, many don't want to hurt the reputation of a luthier, even if they 've made some seriously bad guitars!

This is a delicate issue for luthiers who sometimes rely on custom orders! If customers have disposable income , I guess it's fine, but for the rest of us, it's tricky business.

Luthiers might not like it, but i think the best way to do things is to build a bunch of guitars, bring them to festivals, ahve people try em and let them decide if they want to buy it. I know that bob holo, craig bumgartner , rodrigo shopis, do that in the USA, and it's a really good thing! It's also important to note the dates of construction of the guitars, and how often they've been played. In my opinion, the older the guitar and the more that it has been played, the better for the customer. If you find a guitar that's at least a year old, and that's been played a bit, and you findthat you like the guitar, GET that one, don't ask for a copy of it.. Every guitar is different. I remember that Bob brought 4 or so guitars to DFNW 2013, i thought they were all fine, but they were also vastly different from one another, there were some that i prefered over others , for my own reasons, but that may be different for someone else...

after all, everyone has different needs. Unless we're talking about severe flaws in the design of an instrument, other people's opinions on sound and playability don't mean much.

What do you do, if you don't have the chance of trying a guitar for yourself? You either take the risk, or you wait a bit, maybe buy a gitane , which has great resale value.

You can also go to festivals and try em out.. Django in June, DFNW are great in the USA, Samois is great in Europe, etc...

sorry for the slightly OT rant

Stringswinger

I owned a 14 fret Park Elan that was a superb guitar for me. I sold it to my friend Jason Vanderford who used it for several years when he was in The Hot Club Of San Francisco. I believe he still owns it and loves it. I have played at least 20 other Park Gypsy guitars and have met Shelly. She is a wonderful lutheir and the fit and finish of her guitars are second to none.

They vary in sound from guitar to guitar. Some are great, some are quite good and some are just OK. Do they sound like the best French guitars? Not to my ear. That said, comparing them to Taylor guitars is just plain wrong. They have a sound of their own. I would describe them as warm and lush.

My advice is play before you buy.

Hope that was helpful.

Cheers,

Marc
www.hotclubpacific.Com

Bob Holo

dennis wrote: »

I remember that Bob brought 4 or so guitars to DFNW 2013, i thought they were all fine, but they were also vastly different from one another, there were some that i prefered over others , for my own reasons, but that may be different for someone else...
sorry for the slightly OT rant

I remember that. Your guitar was on the fritz or something and you wound up at the festival without a guitar and you played the Selmer model in the shows that year. I believe that guitar is now Adrian Holovaty's. Joscho liked the Nouveau with the Castellucia style D-hole and played it. Or maybe I'm thinking about 2012. Fapy headlined 2013... sorry - different year. Anyway, I bring them for artist feedback and so I bring a diverse set of designs. I've sold a few to headliners at shows, but I sell through Michael 90% of the time. He is a top-notch dealer and I'm an old hermit. He represents me much better than I could.

To the original question of the thread - Shelley is a good builder and good friend and an ethical person. I wouldn't advise anyone to pass up one of her guitars.

dennis

I've liked every guitar you've built, Bob (that i've tried anyway). The ones that i've preferred were the ones that suited my needs, it's usually a combination of tone/volume/playability (for my tastes). These 3 criteria differ from player to player as I said above. As I've said, purely subjective.

It also depends on how you approach the instrument. Too many factors really!

For instance, Gonzalo Bergara digs in a bit, so he needs a guitar that can handle a bit of that. Adrien Moignard on the other hand , has a much softer attack relying a little bit more on amplification on stage. That's not to say that adrien can't play loud, don't get me wrong! but i've noticed that he is able to seamlessly switch between various techniques because he averages out the dynamics to make everything work; it's also the reason why he can play ultra fast. Gonzalo on the other hand mainly sticks to one technique, and therefore digs in a bit more. When they play live, Adrien probably would need a bit more gain , and Gonzalo, less.

Two different approaches, and therefore, two different needs as far as instruments go.

Therefore, I stand by what I said, you just have to try the instrument for yourself. The only outside opinion that matters is if the luthier is unethical (and even if he/she is, most people don't seem to report it) and if he is consistent in his guitars as far as structural integrity is concerned (again most people dont' seem to report this).

It's tricky business!

AndrewUlle

Thanks for all the input, and I certainly see the dilemma of not wanting to badmouth a luthier.

My problem is two-fold: I am inexperienced in the GJ genre, and I happen to live in a place where GJ is unknown and no music stores carry any manouche guitars at all, of any quality. We have luthiers here, but they only make flat tops and electric guitars for rock music. So unless I want to travel half way across the country or more, I can't really try before I buy.

Most likely I will just stick with what I have until I can make it to a DIJ event. It's not like I have a ton of cash burning a hole in my pocket anyway.