Guitar Wars

Jazzaferri

Has anyone else heard Michael Dunn's new design Ultrafox's.

IMO it is truly amazing.

MichaelHorowitz

My own personal pantheon of contemporary greats is:

Dupont Vieille Reserve - Best Selmer copy! The VRs are just so dead on Selmer it's uncanny, just love them! The only new guitar that really sounds like the old ones....

Hahl - Best Neuvo Gypsy Guitar! Amazing playability and a rich balanced sound you'd expect to hear from a flatop, but still punchy like a Selmer.

Bob Holo - Bob's guitars seem like they come out of some sort of time machine from the 30s! He's got a knack for the traditional tone of the old Selmers and Busatos.

JP Favino - No one has more experience than JP, and his guitars show it! Favinos for the 21st century....balanced, easy to play, and loud, loud, loud...

After having the Jean Barault guitar here I've added him as one of the greats.....the Bireli modele was the most impressive thing I've seen come through here in a long, long time! It's sold but I've got another coming. Barault is also very traditional , like Dupont. But a little less dry and more complex than Dupont, really gorgeous tone!

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rodolphe_toronto

@ Jazzferri: Michael Dunn is a wonderful character! He has his own perspective about building guitars. I'm not crazy about what he's doing. For me it has nothing really to do with Gypys Jazz guitars (OK I have to admit that I'm a purist). He's completly in another world. He experiments a lot.
Interesting to pass some time chatting with him.
+ his band is fun and great :-)

@ Michael: the Dupont is really in the middle of the "guitar War". Very various opinon about them.

@ others: There is another post about the Olivier Marin. Mine is very nice. Well balanced, bright, but not loud enough. But it's pehaps only mine. But the dynamic is exceptionnal.

Japanese Sandman

What? No Ciganos listed?! :roll:

Jazzaferri

Rodolphe

Michael is pretty much just building instruments that interest him now. He is considering maybe building me a Chattarangui but he wanted to listen to and talk with Debashish Battacharya before he committed to doing it. I got to play his new harp guitar that he had just finished when I picked up UFox. He is a great character and a wonderful human.

Perhaps the sound my Ultrafox isn't what some expect in GJ ... the instrument is fabulously responsive has really full rich balanced tone... all the way up and across the board ... lots of volume yet has that je ne sais quoi ... sustainy searing sound :oops: when played hard. IMO and that of the people I play with one of the best sounding guitars we've ever heard even if it has a sound box inside. Add to that the fact that it was finished on Jan 23 of this year ... intentionally ......it will suit me the rest of my days.

One jam buddy has a Favino that he thought was really nice until he heard the Ufox. Now he says it sounds tinny to him. To me I kinda like the thin dry sound of his Favino, it's just different. Not my style to play as my main axe but..... good fun to play. The guy who plays rhythm in our duet has a Dunn that is a superb GJ rhythm instrument and good for solo stuff. Michael built it maybe 15 years ago. I played his D hole "Queen for over a year while he was building Ufox and it elicited lots of great comments from everyone who heard it. I loved it and if he would have parted with it ....

In my limited experience all really good luthiers who have hit their prime, produce instruments that are very well made, responsive, and balanced. I think every luthier will admit that every once in a while something magic happens and a truly great one is born. IMO if one is lucky enough to own a magic instrument that is a great privilege

All that stuff being said ...... tone is so subjective and so long as the instrument is TRULY responsive and balanced (and in tune with itself) all the way up and across ... well i feel that the rest is personal preference

Adriano

Hey Michael,

You must be one of the very few players who had pretty much every gypsy guitar in their hands. I am curious if one would have the $$ what your recommendation would be between a Hahl, a Barault and a Rodrigues? Or would you prefer something like a vintage Busato or Favino over these, since they're pretty much in the same pricerange.
Best,

Adriano.

MichaelHorowitz

Adriano wrote:

You must be one of the very few players who had pretty much every gypsy guitar in their hands. I am curious if one would have the $$ what your recommendation would be between a Hahl, a Barault and a Rodrigues? Or would you prefer something like a vintage Busato or Favino over these, since they're pretty much in the same pricerange.

Hi Adriano,

Well, it really depends on so many factors including playability, sound, practicality, where and how you perform, etc. There's no doubt the old classics like Busato, Selmer, and Favino are hard to beat acoustically. They will make the hair stand up on the back of your neck! But every guitar is an individual...just because you've played one doesn't mean all the others sound like that. In fact, the older these guitars get the more individual they become.

However, these old guitars don't have the modern ergonomic necks and aren't capable of the ultra low action setups you can get on a Hahl or Barault. If you're willing to spend a lot of time and money you can get an old guitar to play very easy, but it's not always easy. The new guitars are perfect out of the box.

Also, the old guitars tend to be more brash by nature and require very good technique to sound their best. New guitars aren't as loud and don't have as much "wow factor," but tend to have a more lush and forgiving sound.

And if you need to use pickups the newer guitars are easier to deal with as you do mind drilling holes in them.

Personally, I play a vintage Busato when I record or play concerts where I can mic it. But if I need to amplify and am just playing restaurants and such I tend to play a modern guitar like Barault.

'm

Adriano

Thanks Michael, I forgot to mention one though. The Eimers from Holland guitars seem to be getting some pretty good reactions, how do you rate these against say the Baraults, since they both seem to try to get as close to a Selmer as possible? And what do you think about the Rodrigues ones?
Thanks,
Adriano

Adriano

Hi Michael,
I'm sorry, I just realised I meant the Rodrigo Shopis guitars (Rodrigues?? Where did that come from? Probably a restaurant in Barcelona where I may have indulged in some local wine research..?)
Thanks,

Adriano

Jeff Moore

The Busato has an extreme quickness that seems suited to a very talented lead player. Light plucks get you a full note, slightly more effort gets you singing notes and medium plucks get you "tube" breakup, yet there also seems to be no limit. Hard plucks get you "tube" breakup with more volume. The sound of it is clean (as Michael has oft noted): strong fundamntals. The net is that a little effort and a LOT of dexterity gives you the possibility to get from 0-60 and back with the absolute minimum of effort. That quickness seems to also mean that you can set a Busato to play almost like a tele - real low, and if your dexterous enough, its all there if you can get control of it. I've got a long way to go, personally, to get what's in the Busato out.

The VR is lush and most of that 0-60 thing is also there, and it gives excellent results for many styles of play. Result: If you play different styles, a VR will treat you real good.
If you want to play Gypsy lead, a Busato will teach you about your picking hand to the fullest extent. Both record wonderfully: satisfying and "authoritative".
I've only played two Busatos (Royal) and two VR's, but these things seemed to be true of those as well.
I've never played the other guitars you asked about.