Looking for a used guitar - some general questions

woodamand

As I mentioned, I will be sticking with my archtops for now. However, I don't see any magic in any type of guitar to where if you play chords with some force, like I do anyway, that you can't tell if it has good tone. Some of the guitars sounded good to me, but I didn't fall in love with them. I am sure not a fan of the type of strings used on these guitars- give me heavy flat wounds any day, something I can really push hard.

It seems to me that people forget that tone is a completely subjective experience, and what you like and what I like can be different, we can both be right - and the impression of the tone can change on any particular day depending on a vast array of variables.

It is the same with any instrument. I have fantastic vintage clarinets, and some days some sound better to me than others, and I have played these horns for years so it is not like I am unfamiliar with them.

The one guitar that I played in Seattle that really sounded bad - even Michael said it wasn't the greatest sounding instrument, and he is trying to sell the thing, right? So my ears aren't dead quite yet.

What I am seriously interested in, and impressed by, is the results of the technique involved, even if I am not always enamored of the tone. For me, Django's tone sounds best when he is amplified with that bit of distortion from the single coil pickup and the amp - and that is true for me but maybe not for you.

I'm really looking forward to learning to play this style, no matter what guitar I am playing it on.

Jim Kaznosky

What a fascinating thread.

woodamand

I like it! And I just set myself up to get some GJ lessons from a reputable local teacher, so I can learn how to set my stroke (down and up) and pimp my pompe. You just wait, in 30 years I will be able to keep up with anyone.

Jazzaferri

Well I have to comment that my Dunn sounds lovely at pp to ff. its solid wood but it does have a soundbox and a really big body.

BluesBop Harry

I never said you have to attack the guitars hard to get them to sing... It's not about brute force but instead a particular way to strike the strings.

And it's not a secret or magic either. It's just a distinct way to use a pick that gypsy guitars seem to respond to. From pp to ff as Jazzaferri said.

Stringswinger wrote: »

Enrique, before he retired, Bob Benedetto was getting fifty grand for guitars that he built himself. I wish I was that crazy.....

Fifty grand! Now, that is crazy!
I'm not questioning his guitar building or marketing skills. But he clearly has a different aesthetic concept of what a guitar should sound like... Just like Django saying american guitars sounded like tin cans

woodamand wrote: »

For me, Django's tone sounds best when he is amplified with that bit of distortion from the single coil pickup and the amp

If that's the case, the guitar won't be such a big factor. It'd be best for you to invest in a good Stimer, Peche a la mouche or similar and drive it through a small tube amp

Jazzaferri

Bob experimented a lot with different guitars including a really neat gut strung violin style peg head one off. He mostly built what his customers ordered.

Stringswinger

I doubt that Bob Benedetto really hates all Selmer style guitars or that Django really hated Gibson archtops.

In Bob's case, I think he was trying to sell his Frank Vignola model. In Django's case he was trying to throw a bone to Maurice Selmer, who was giving him free guitars.

At the end of the day it is all about personal taste. I prefer a heavy guage flatwound equipped archtop to a Selmer guitar. I like the American neck profile, warmer tone, 9th fret marker, 17 inch body size, shorter scale etc. I do like the Selmer style guitar as well, especially in an unamplified setting. I totally understand that others may feel differently (especially those who frequent this forum). When it comes to matters of personal taste, there is no right or wrong.

What I disagree with are those who claim that you have to play a particular style guitar in a particular manner or it's wrong. My experience so far, is that those who hold these rigid positions are usually not the best players.

All players should follow their own muse, try lots of different guitars and lots of different techniques until they find what works for them.

In Gypsy Jazz and music in general, it is not a one size fits all world. That is something that I am certain of. (Another thing I am certain of is that Michael Horowitz is the best in the business when it comes to Gypsy jazz related stuff). That is my view and I am sticking to it. YMMV

Cheers to all,

Marc

www.hotclubpacific.com

sadow

In his own words, Django himself contradicts any suggestion that he preferred Selmers over American archtops because he was getting free guitars from Selmer. As Michael Dregni writes about Django's 1946-47 trip to America on tour with the Ellington band:

Django also missed his French guitar. He had dreamed of the gleaming American archtops from fabled makers like Gibson, but in the end, his loyalties remained true to his Selmer. During his tour, Django telegraphed Delaunay to bring his Selmer guitar to him. When Delaunay duly arrived, he carried a new acoustic Selmer guitar sent to Django with best wishes from Maurice Selmer, son of the firm's founder. Delaunay accidentally damaged the Selmer while in transit, although it was soon put right. Yet Delaunay came after the Ellington tour, so Django never got a chance to play his trusted guitar with the big band. Still, Django swooned when he got his hands on the Selmer. "My brother," he said to Delaunay, "all the Americans will wish they could play on this guitar! At least it's got tone, you can hear all the chords like you can on the piano. Don't talk to me any more about their tinpot guitars! Listen to this, it speaks like a cathedral!" Artist endorsements were rarely so heartfelt.

(From "Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend," pp. 224-225)

Jazzaferri

Aleman Also played a national steel guitar. The Germans confiscated it when he left Europe atbthe begiining of ww2

As of june 94 Bob Benedetto had built 323 carved 50 violin/viola 157 solid body electrics and a cuople of electric basses. The model names of his personlly handbuilt carved archtop guitars are Cremona, Limelight, Americana (non cutaway), Venizia (no pickup) 7String, Fratello, and Manhattan.

The Vignola and Pizzarelli models were made in a Fender workshop under his supervision.

You can still buy a Cremona, his top of the line guitar, hand built by someone he trained for only $30,000. It does come with a case.


I almost got one of his handbuilts second hand but got gazumped by a local who paid cash, no shipping.

Chiefbigeasy

I have to agree, these guitars have a very distinctive sound, one that I was not sure I liked my first got my own. However I've grown to love the sound, especially as my technique has improved.

Makes you wonder, what would a Stradivarius sound like with a player who had only been studying violin for a few months.