Show your guitars

Jangle_Jamie · February 2023

Hello folks, I'm relatively new to the forum but thought I'd start a thread about showing off your guitars! I love looking at members' guitars here and reading about their attributes. About me, I've been playing guitar since I was 12 (I'm now 44). I played classical guitar and was in a classical group in Lincolnshire in the 1990s. I first really heard Django when the documentary 'The Django Legacy' was shown on British television around about 1994, although I think I'd been aware of the music before then. My grandfather was a jazz guitarist and double bass player in North Devon after the war, but he died before I was born so I never got swept up by the music until later on. I bought my first gypsy guitar in 2003, a Gitane D500, and went to Samois in 2004. I didn't take my guitar, and it has really only been the last fifteen years that I've tried to improve and get a bit better at playing gypsy jazz. I'd never met anyone or played with anyone else in the style, until last year when joy of joys, I met a Parisian guitarist who'd moved up here to the Highlands of Scotland. We hit it off immediately, and I have a renewed passion and a lust for improving my playing.

So, my guitars -

My Gitane D500 which I stripped and french polished.

I then bought an Aria MM20 for £99. I refinished that as well, but sold it a few years later to a friend.

I think my next purchase was a Gallato RS1939 Angelo Debarre oval hole. I also refinished it and I still like playing it (I played it on Sunday in the pub for our monthly gypsy swing session). It's quite a heavy guitar with a big chunky walnut neck. The tone is quite flat with not much bass, but it really cuts through and has great volume when you want it to.

I think the next guitar I bought was built for me by a friend in Melbourne, Australia. His name was Marcus De Rijk, and he was an up and coming gypsy guitar builder. This was only his second guitar and he was working on his third when his life was tragically cut short when hit by a car as a pedestrian. I will always treasure this guitar. It is a thing of beauty - solid fiddleback blackwood back and sides, celerytop pine top, ebony fingerboard, Gallato tuners, Killy Nonis tailpiece (was Gallato but I just changed it, plus a new bridge by Robert Ford). Lovely woody tone, but not quite the volume when you attack the strings.

I bought a Gitane DG370 Dorado Schmitt which apart from a new Miller tailpiece, is as it was. Bigtone pickup fitted and I love this guitar. It's loud but refined and looks wonderful with the maple neck and flamed maple body.

Many years ago, perhaps 2008, I played a Gitane 310 Lulo Reinhardt guitar in Hobgoblin Music in London and was in love. I almost bought it (I think it was £700) but couldn't really afford it. Fast forward to last year and one came up on Ebay and I just had to get it (it was about £600 so not a bad price). It's absolutely pristine and looks to have never been played. I plan to refinish it this year and put some better hardware on it (Killy Nonis tailpiece at the ready). I expect I'll be playing this a lot when it's completed.

I bought this old Henri Miller guitar a few years ago. It was a wall-hanger, but I am hoping to either get it playing nicely or sell it to someone else as a bit of a project.

Another Gitane, this time a birdseye maple DG270 Andy MacKenzie model. This is really an excellent guitar - the loudest and most capable of the lot, but perhaps a little too loud for rhythm. I refinished this and the tone and volume has become sensational! Killy Nonis tailpiece fitted but original compensated bridge left on - it works so why change it?!

Finally an odd little guitar that is really rather lovely. The neck is straight as an arrow (I think it is steel reinforced) and it's a joy to play. Not as loud as the others, but that's expected with the smaller body and slightly suspect materials. I had to do a bit of work on this but it's turned into a great little guitar. The pickup is a Shadow SH SB1 double bass pickup and works very well on acoustic guitars.

...and finally finally, an old EKO fretless bass that is close to a double bass sound (for a guitar anyway). Another Shadow pickup that works a treat. This is a brilliant bass!

Let's see your guitars then! Best wishes, Jamie

DoubleWhisky · February 2023

Those refinished ones do look very tasty, wow!

Jangle_Jamie · February 2023

Thanks. The idea was always to improve the aesthetics and to find out what happens to the tone/volume when there's not a thick layer on the top. The DG270 has dramatically changed, so it will be interesting to find out what happens to the Lulo Reinhardt model.

I will also add that all these guitars bar the De Rijk were bought secondhand and all for a lot less than you'd expect. The Gallato was £450 from a chap in Edinburgh, the Gitane 370 was about £550 I think.

AndyW · February 2023

"Show your guitars"

you never have to ask me twice ;-)

hope we can meet for a jam when you're down in Glasgow in March, Jamie.

I'll talk to the gang on Sunday, see who's up for a one off Thursday night jam.

Jangle_Jamie · February 2023

Very nice instruments there Andy. What's the black one on the right? Could it be a Morena? How's the tone?

As for March, I have a concert I'm going to from 6pm till 8pm on the 2nd. I could potentially be free for a jam before then, but probably not after. I'll see what my wife says about after (kids bedtime in a strange hotel might need two of us!)

wim · February 2023

It's a pleasant surprise to see a De Rijk guitar in the collection. I saw his first one- I was just borrowing it, not sure where in the world it ended up! This was 10 years ago, sorry for the sloppy playing

RIP Marcus

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6ST8K6y0QI

Jangle_Jamie · February 2023

Amazing to see this again and put a face/player to the name! Yes I played this guitar in Melbourne many years ago, and again just last October. The guitar belongs to Marcus' wife Claire. It was great and moving to play it again. Claire and my wife have been friends for more than twenty years and sang together professionally in The Australian Voices.

oh, and your playing is not at all sloppy! You want to hear sloppy, I'll give you sloppy!