Introduction of East Indian Rosewood to North America: When?

[Kerry Krishna]

This question is coming up because of an East Indian Rosewood guitar from the late 20s that I was looking at buying. It is for sure not Braz, and several folks who KNOW Braz say that it is most likely EIR. That is an awful long time ago for this rosewood here in North America, and I am wondering if any Forum folk here on this forum have some real info on this. If I am really lucky, maybe someone can tell me what the price difference would have been between the two woods. I am thinking that FRank will know for sure, and maybe some of the Martin historian folk also... Thanks people!... Kerry K

[Donald A. Fortune]

Hi Kerry- I just checked LMII web site and they have East Indain rosewood in stock in three grades.
I ordered some here a while ago to make a classical guitar and I was verry pleased with it.
It has a nice ring to it and it isn't too awfully hard to work with.
Check out the web site and see if it's what you are looking for... WWW.LMII.COM
Peace, Donald

[Frank Ford]

A goodly number of years ago I had a Lyon & Healy (Washburn) guitar with Indian Rosewood back/sides. It dated from the early 20s, and was a fine short scale 00-size guitar. Here's one like it in the FRETS.COM museum:

http://www.frets.com/FRETSPages/Museum/Guitar/Washburn/LHGoldLeaf/l...

I believe it is also Indian rosewood.

As to when the trade in Indian rosewood (Dalbergia latifolia) started, I haven't a clue.

Personally, I think all this commotion about the quality and value of Brazilian rosewood has gotten way out of hand. Back when I was first building guitars, Brazilian cost probably twice as much as Indian. Now, it's more like 10-20 times the price for Brazilian. In my opinion it's strictly a matter of people willing to pay a fortune for something they're being told they can't have. For sure, making an instrument of Brazilian rosewood does not ensure a great sounding result just because of the species.

Ever see the move "The Freshman?" In it, Marlon Brando does a great sendup of himself as the Godfather, running an endangered species eating club, where members pay as much as a million bucks to eat a dinner of the last example of a species.

Rant off. . .

[Ned Knepp]

I have a guitar that is undetermined Rosewood. I'm pretty sure it's Indian but If I were to discover it was Brazilian, it would be worth much more on the market because of it ... but wouldn't make a lick of difference to how it sounds.

The guitar sounds very good and and plays well and, for me, that is the reason to own a guitar.

Ned

[Donald A. Fortune]

I think I made a goof- I read your original post as you looking to buy rosewood and not the guitar it self..
Don't ever get old because you make mistakes like this all the time...... peace,Donald

[Kerry Krishna]

Thank you for your responses so far. So just to clarify , Brazilian is not the subject here. I already know that the axe is not braz. I was just so surprised to find something as odd as EIR in a guitar made in 1929. I have this thread running over on Collings Forum. One of the members there pointed out that many decades ago,Gibson started using EIR. He figured the 40s sometime. Any other folks with some knowledge here?

[onewent]

Kerry , I believe Gibson is known to have used EIR when they first built the jumbos in the 30's..Tom

[Kerry Krishna]

I Emailed George Gruen about this. He was gracious enough to send this reply...:While the majority of American guitars made prior to 1970 feature Brazilian rosewood rather than Indian rosewood, we have encountered guitars which clearly look like Indian rosewood date from as early as the 1920s. The pre-World War II Gibson Advanced Jumbos as well as rosewood J-200s look like Indian rosewood. Without doing extensive testing such as DNA analysis it's hard to be sure exactly what some of this wood is, but it is clearly not Brazilian rosewood that Gibson was using in the 1930s on Advanced Jumbos and J-200s. European classical guitar makers such as Hauser used both Indian rosewood and Brazilian rosewood in the 1930s and made no distinction in pricing between two.

George Gruhn