scott gannon's Page

Scott, don't feel bad about the Ovation bashing! People just have their opinions. Some good tips there , though.  But ,wow , that archtop! What's the story on it? I'm thinking that is sitka spruce from a marine worm eaten log. It is absolutely amazing! What's bracing like? Etc.? 

Thank you in advance for your response.

C

Thanks for the info on Bennedetto archtop.  I'm just a dabbler myself. Good luck on the Ovation , I'm sure it will turn out fine. I recomend getting old guitars,yard sales, cheap or free, or whatever. Most will have conventional construction details and you will get experience with these. Try and make each one set up as perfectly as possible. Perfect for practice at neck removal, a fun operation, but always risky to the finish etc. from steam. But you will get the practice for real guitars. .Thanks again for the response on the "Holey Archtop" !

Howdy Scott.Can you tell me the story of this guitar in your profile pic?

Thanks Scott - much appreciated.  The "Black Tiger" is a favorite where ever I take it and I rarely see it again because someone is playing the thing... until I want to leave...  I built it in 2006 I believe and at that time we did not have any other examples that I knew of of guitars built with Tasmanian Tiger Myrtle.  So it was a bit of an experiment in terms of the tonewood but turned out very well.  It's VERY loud and louder than most dreads and with the modern 25.4 scale there is lots of energy to drive the thin top.  The top is master grade and when I decided to paint it was NOT because of any flaws of mistakes but instead because a black top is historically accurate on 1937 L-OOs which the guitar is loosely patterned after.  I was looking to show off the spots on the Tiger Myrtle but also do a modern looking "drop top look" on this one too with the black top matching the black spots in the TM.  I frequently like to go to the trouble of only using real wood for bindings and then to instead of contrasting the bindings as many makers do I wanted to hide the bindings almost as if the guitar is unbound.  So... the back is bound in tiger myrtle and the top is bound in ebony and the ebony is not painted.  In direct sunlight you can see the ebony bindings but the rest of the time it looks like a 1/4" thick drop top.

 

I used tapered and very light bracing on this one because it was never intended to be for sale and knowing as I do that gloss black shows off any imperfections all too well.

 

In terms of tone it's lush with lots of overtones, for some types of music too much in the way of overtones in my view but it has more of a rosewood tone with a mahogany projection.  The fretboard is bound in TM as well and the bridge pins are snakewood which is almost a perfect match for the TM.

 

There is a whole page devoted to this guitar on my sight www.heshtone.com if you are interested and thanks again for your comments, Scott!

 

Hesh