the guitar collection

ThE GUITAR COLLECTION

An elite gathering of 150 exceptional guitars
Walter Carter | Photography by greg morgan, John Peden, and marco prozzo
Copyright © 2011 becker&mayer!, LLC

All rights reserved under the Pan American and International Copyright Convention.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from
the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available.

Manufactured in China

Double-neck ’05 Edition

ISBN-13: 978-1-60380-169-0
ISBN-10: 1-60380-169-3

Flat-top ’43 Edition

ISBN-13: 978-1-60380-170-6
ISBN-10: 1-60380-170-7

Solidbody ’54 Edition

ISBN-13: 978-1-60380-171-3
ISBN-10: 1-60380-171-5

All images are the copyright of the guitar owner at the time the photograph was
taken unless stated otherwise.
See photography credits on page 509.

Epic Ink
11120 NE 33rd Place, Ste. 101
Bellevue, Washington 98004
www.epicinkbooks.com
Author Designers
Walter Carter Todd Bates
Rosebud Eustace
Photographers
Joanna Price
Greg Morgan
John Peden Editors
Marco Prozzo Kristin Mehus-Roe
Amelia Riedler
PANELists
Walter Carter Production coordinators
Alan Di Perna Leah Finger
Matthew Hill Tom Miller
Michael Molenda Diane Ross
Tom Wheeler
Photo Director
Bryan Yates
Shayna Ian
ADVISORy board
Product developer
Dave Belzer
Peter Schumacher
Brad Tolinski
Lynn Wheelwright Licensing Manager
Josh Anderson

Contracts Manager
Kelley Notter

Associate Managing Editor

Miriam Hathaway

Associate Publisher
Adrian Liang

Publisher
Andrew s. Mayer
contents
About the Book 11 Stromberg Master 400 “yellow cloud,” Fender Stratocaster 228 Gretsch “The Twang Machine,” bo diddley 328 Mosrite Double-neck, barbara mandrell 436
INtroduction 13 irving ashby 120 Fender Stratocaster, Eldon Shamblin 230 Gibson ES-335TDN 332 Coral Vincent Bell Electric Sitar, Rod Richards 440
Wilkanowski 124 Fender Stratocaster “Mary Kaye,” Gibson ES-335TDC “Crossroads,” Eric Clapton 334 Ampeg Dan Armstrong ARM-G1, greg ginn 442
Stradivarius “The Rawlins” 16 Ro-Pat-In Electric Prototype 128 Mary Kaye and Johnny Cucci 232 Gibson ES-345 338 Ovation Adamas Prototype 446
Fabricatore 20 Elektro A-25 “Frying Pan” 132 Fender Stratocaster “Brownie,” Eric Clapton 236 Gibson ES-345TD, Chuck Berry 340 Veillette-Citron “VC Number Six” 448
Lyre-Guitar 24 Ro-Pat-In Electric Spanish Prototype, Fender Stratocaster “Blackie,” Eric Clapton 240 Gibson ES-355 “Lucille,” B.B. King 342 Alembic Exploiter Spyder Bass, john entwistle 452
Torres 26 gage brewer 136 Fender Stratocaster, Jimmie Vaughan 244 Epiphone Sheraton 346 Steinberger XL2 Bass 456
Martin “Stauffer-Style” 28 Rickenbacker Vibrola Spanish 140 Fender Stratocaster “Number One,” Stevie Epiphone Casino, howlin’ wolf 348 B.C. Rich Bich ten-String 460
Martin Custom 32 Vivi-Tone 142 Ray Vaughan 248 Gibson Les Paul Custom 352 Kramer “Frankenstrat,” edward van halen 464
Haynes-Tilton 34 Audiovox Model 736 bass 144 Fender Stratocaster “Lenny,” Stevie Ray Vaughan 252 Gibson SG Standard “the fool,” Eric Clapton Les Paul Standard Copy, Slash 468
Orville Gibson 38 Slingerland Songster Model 401 146 Fender Jazzmaster 256 and todD rundgren 354 PRS “Golden Eagle,” howard leese 470
Gibson Style O Artist 40 National Electric Spanish 150 Fender Bass VI 260 Gibson SG Special, Pete Townshend 358 PRS Double-neck Dragon 2005 474
Gibson Style U Harp Guitar 42 Gibson ES-150 Prototype 152 Gibson Les Paul Model 264 Epiphone Crestwood Custom 362 Prs Santana I “red coral,” carlos santana 478
Gibson L-5, Maybelle Carter 46 Gibson ES-250, Charlie Christian 154 Gibson Les Paul Custom 268 Gibson EDS-1275, Jimmy Page 366 Yellow Cloud, prince 482
Gibson Super 400 50 Gibson ES-250, Alvino Rey 156 Gibson Les Paul Model “Goldie,” Dickey Betts 270 Gibson Firebird III 370 Hamer Custom Five-Neck, rick nielsen 484
Weissenborn Style 1 52 Gibson ES-300, Les Paul 160 GIBSON Les Paul Standard, Eric Clapton and Fender Telecaster, Muddy Waters 372 Ibanez Jem 7WH Prototype “Evo,” steve vai 488
National Style 4, Tampa Red 54 Gibson Electric Upright Bass 162 Paul Kossoff 272 Fender Telecaster, Clarence White and Parker Fly Artist 492
National Style o 58 “The Log,” les paul 164 Gibson Les Paul Standard, Duane Allman 274 Marty Stuart 376 Monteleone Radio City 496
Martin 00-18, Jimmie Rodgers 62 Gibson ES-300, Danny Cedrone 168 Gibson Les Paul Standard “Pearly Gates,” Fender Stratocaster, Mike Mitchell 380 D’Aquisto New Yorker seven-String 500
Martin 00-42, Gene Autry 64 Gibson ES-5, carl perkins 172 Billy Gibbons 278 Fender Telecaster, Joe Strummer 384 D’Aquisto Centura 502
Martin D-2, Luther Ossenbrink 68 Gibson ES-175, steve howe 176 Gibson Les Paul Standard, Jimmy Page 282 Fender Telecaster, James Burton 388
Martin 000-42, Eric Clapton 70 Gibson ES-295 180 Gibson Flying V “Number 7,” lonnie mack 286 Fender stratocaster, Jimi Hendrix 390 Index 505
Martin D-45S, Austin Wood 72 Gibson L-5CESN 182 Gibson Flying V “Lucy,” albert king 290 Fender Mustang, Adrian Belew 394 biographies & Acknowledgments 507
Martin D-28, Hank Williams 74 Gibson Byrdland 186 Gibson EMS-1235 Double-neck 294 Fender Competition Mustang, Kurt Cobain 396 photography credits 509
Martin D-18, Elvis Presley 76 Epiphone Emperor 190 Kay K-161 “Thin Twin,” howlin’ wolf 298 Fender Jazz Bass, Aston “Family Man” Barrett 400 Thank yous 511
Gibson Nick Lucas Special 80 Guild Merle Travis 194 Danelectro Deluxe model 6027 302 HÖfner 500/1, paul m c cartney 402
Gibson L-Century 82 Bigsby, Merle Travis 196 Gretsch Chet Atkins Hollow Body Zemaitis twelve-String, jimi hendrix 406
Stahl By Larson Brothers 86 Bigsby, Hezzy Hall 200 (Model 6120), Chet Atkins 306 G. Stanley Francis twelve-String, pete seeger 408
Stella twelve-String, lead belly 90 Bigsby Double-neck, j.b. thomas 202 Gretsch Chet Atkins Hollow Body Gibson J-160E, John Lennon 412
Gibson SJ-200, ray whitley 94 Fender Esquire, jeff beck 206 (Model 6120), Eddie Cochran 308 Guild F-30NT Special, Paul Simon 416
Gibson J-200, emmylou harris 98 Fender Broadcaster 210 Gretsch Chet Atkins Solid Body National Glenwood 99 418
Gibson J-45, buddy holly 100 Fender Telecaster, Howard Roberts 212 (Model 6121), Chet Atkins 312 Guild thunderbird S-200, Muddy Waters 422
Gretsch 150 Artist 104 Fender Telecaster, Danny Gatton 216 Gretsch Chet Atkins Country Gentleman 314 Rickenbacker 325-12, John Lennon 424
Gretsch Synchromatic 400 108 Fender Telecaster “Nancy,” Roy Buchanan 220 Gretsch White Falcon 318 Rickenbacker 360-12, Roger M c Guinn 426
D’Angelico Excel 112 Fender Telecaster “Micawber,” Keith Richards 222 Gretsch Silver Jet, billy zoom 322 Mosrite Ventures 430
D’Angelico New Yorker Cutaway 116 Fender Precision Bass, donald “duck” dunn 226 Gretsch White Penguin 324 Mosrite Ventures II, Johnny Ramone 432

About the Book
More than two years ago, when the idea that ultimately became The Guitar
Collection first presented itself, it seemed like an impossible endeavor. Not only
would we be creating the biggest guitar book ever made, we would also be
tracking down and photographing 150 of the most important guitars in existence.
Giant in scale, this book would come with its own guitar case and a companion
book to tell the cultural and historical “stories” of the guitars and the masters who
played them. There were numerous issues to be solved, from how to produce a
book of this sort—was it even possible?—to how to find the guitars themselves.
The first question to be tackled, of course, was how to decide which guitars
to include. Acknowledging that ultimately a list of the top 150 guitars is subjective,
we needed to establish a fair and balanced selection process. It became clear
that the best way to do so was with a panel of experts—guitar aficionados with a
range of perspectives—as well as the advice of guitar dealers, collectors, makers,
and players. In our search, one name came up again and again: Walter Carter.
A renowned guitar historian and author, Carter had to be a key element of this
book, and we were thrilled when he agreed both to be on the panel and to author
the larger book. The rest of the panel quickly fell into place—Tom Wheeler, also a
guitar author and the former editor of Guitar Player magazine; Michael Molenda,
the current editor of Guitar Player; Matthew Hill, curator of the Musical Instrument
Museum; Bryan Yates, a guitar expert who was instrumental in the production of
the Experience Music Project guitar display; and Alan di Perna, a noted writer and
editor of Guitar World magazine. We also hired Art Thompson, associate editor
for Guitar Player, to coauthor The Guitar Collection: Stories with panelists Michael
Molenda and Alan di Perna. And we benefited greatly from the insights and advice
of our advisory panel, comprising Dave Belzer, vintage guitar buyer for Guitar
Center; Lynn Wheelwright, vintage guitar expert; and Brad Tolinski, editor of Guitar
World and Guitar Aficionado magazines.
Our panelists and advisory board spent many long months in discussions
(some of them rather heated), including a grueling two-day-long panelist meeting
in Seattle, whittling down a final list of guitars. Even as the debate raged on, our
photographers—all stringed-instrument connoisseurs in their own right—began
traveling across the United States and to England in order to shoot the rare and
fantastic guitars our panelists had agreed upon. Each shoot—thirty-three in
total—required extensive preparation and state-of-the-art equipment due to the
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size at which the guitars would be portrayed in The Guitar Collection. John Peden,
Greg Morgan, and Marco Prozzo brought sixty years of collective photographic
experience and expertise to shoots that required a delicate manner, outrageous
confidence, and an artistic vision. The guitars they were handling, such as Stevie
Ray Vaughan’s Number One and Paul McCartney’s Höfner, were sometimes valued
at close to one million dollars and had even greater historical and cultural value.
And throughout all of this, our production and design teams were collaborating
on an aesthetic vision and a means to source the specialty materials the book
required. The case would be custom manufactured and The Guitar Collection
would need to be printed by one of the few companies in the world capable of
creating a book at this size.
The hours spent on this book are difficult to fathom—certainly hundreds by
the panelists, printers, and photographers, and thousands by the writers and
in-house crew. Our team would ultimately comprise more than twenty people—
and that number doesn’t include the many collectors, museums, photographer and
technical assistants, printers, lawyers, videographers, consultants, copy editors,
and proofers who would contribute their talents. Much more than just a book,
the project became the supreme publishing challenge for everyone involved—an
example of how impressive a book can be with unlimited creativity, collaboration,
and passion devoted to it.
We believe—as we truly believe you will, too—it was all worth it. We present to
you: The Guitar Collection.
—The editors

INTRODUCTION
By virtue of its scope—not to mention its physical size—this book presents itself as not
just The Guitar Collection but rather as THE Guitar Collection. Despite few limits in the
choice of guitars for our collection, creating the guitar collection was a surprisingly dif-
ficult goal to execute.
The ultimate collection of guitars would seem easy to define. Just imagine Noah
gathering one of every model ever made. But that would be the ultimate amass-
ment of guitars. A collection is different. A collection has a focus or a theme or
some qualification for inclusion. It doesn’t have to be gargantuan. The collection of
author Jonathan Kellerman, for example, numbers a little over one hundred instru-
ments and is focused on a few areas, the most memorable of which is acoustic
Hawaiian guitars. Even more focused is a collection put together by Dallas psy-
chologist Thomas Van Hoose of Gibson Super 400s—one example of each version,
a total of only fifteen guitars. These collections clearly reflect the owners’ personal
passions. My own collection has always been similarly defined by my interests as
a player, initially in Hawaiian-style guitars (both electric and acoustic) and more
recently in mandolas and other mandolin-family instruments.
On the other end of the spectrum are collections that are virtually unlimited—at
least by the collector’s financial resources. The Scott Chinery collection, for example,
was put together in the 1990s by a millionaire who bought every collectible fretted
instrument he could find. Chinery’s passion for guitars seemed to be more strongly
expressed in the blue guitars he commissioned from leading archtop makers than in
the excesses of his vintage collection. Roy Acuff, the country music icon, seems to
have bought every odd or unusual instrument he saw as he assembled a collection
over his lifetime. With instruments as diverse as a Vivi-Tone bodyless electric mando-
cello and an ultrafancy Washburn flat-top guitar, his collection was almost impossible
to describe, except to say that it comprised instruments that caught Roy’s attention.
Akira Tsumura, heir to a Japanese cosmetics empire, collected enough Jazz Age
banjos in the 1980s and 1990s to publish a weighty tome called 1001 Banjos, but it
struck me not so much as the banjo collection, only the largest.
As impressive as these collections were, they did not command the level of
respect or awe that the collection should have. The proof lies in the simple fact
that many no longer exist. Chinery’s instruments were sold off individually after his
death in 2000. Acuff’s were taken off display at Nashville’s Opryland complex within
a few years of his death in 1992 and stored in a basement room, where they were
destroyed by floodwaters in 2010. Tsumura’s collection was broken up and sold when
Japanese authorities discovered he had commingled business and personal funds.
A truly astounding collection of instruments—all kinds of musical instruments—
resides at the National Music Museum in Vermillion, South Dakota. Despite its size,
there is focus—many areas of focus and many true collections—not just a Noah’s
ark for instruments. Nevertheless, after walking through room after room of displayed
instruments, with the knowledge that thousands more are in storage due to a short-
age of display space, the goal of assembling and presenting the ultimate collection
seems overwhelming, if not unreachable.
A book, however, has a finite number of pages. The Guitar Collection had to be
limited to a certain number of instruments, and that number was determined to be 150.
While that number made for a manageable collection, it did not make the job of deter-
mining which instruments warranted inclusion any easier. To do that, we needed to
set an organizational guideline. We decided to present these instruments in a roughly
chronological, historical order, as opposed to grouping them by maker, thereby giving
the collection the broadest of story lines: the history of the guitar.
History is only a general framework, though, and not a focus. Furthermore, the
history of guitar models is only one facet of the guitar story. In imagining the audience
for this collection—people with a passion for guitars—we would certainly want to
appeal to the curator of a recent exhibit on the art of guitars, who once dismissed a
Gibson ES-150 (Gibson’s first electric model, made famous by pioneering jazz guitar-
ist Charlie Christian) as “just another brown guitar.” And we would want to appeal to
the prominent vintage guitar dealer who asked “Who gives a ****?” about a refinished
Gibson SG Standard, even if it had been owned by rock guitar god Eric Clapton.
To reach these disparate guitar enthusiasts, we felt that the guitars for this collection
should be chosen by experts from their ranks. So a committee was formed—a panel
who would choose which 150 guitars to include. On the far historical end, Matthew Hill
is an organologist, an academic term for one who studies the science of musical instru-
ments (and a term that has not yet made its way into the everyday lexicon of guitar
buffs). At the other end of the spectrum, Michael Molenda is the editor of Guitar Player
magazine, a position that requires him to put together a commercial product every
month that appeals to the largest number of guitarists. Alan di Perna, an associate edi-
tor for Guitar World magazine, also has a background in writing for today’s young guitar
crowd. In the middle of the historical-commercial axis are Tom Wheeler, former editor
of Guitar Player and the author of the groundbreaking book American Guitars; Bryan
Yates, producer of the interviews and audio clips for the Experience Museum Project’s
guitar exhibit, entitled The Quest for Volume; and myself, former Gibson historian and
author of ten books on vintage guitars and guitar companies.
This diversity of the committee led to some interesting decisions. At one point the
Stratocaster was in danger of being over-represented. One faction suggested cutting
a pristine 1954 example, but to other committee members that guitar should have
been the cornerstone of any Strat collection. Some who felt the ’54 was necessary
wondered if we really needed two Clapton Strats. Should we cut Brownie, the guitar
Clapton used on “Layla”? In those moments, one might have wondered if it were
really possible to assemble a collection that would appeal to all guitar enthusiasts.
Would this book even make it out of committee?
In comparing apples and oranges—an Ibanez Jem owned by Steve Vai and a
parlor guitar made by C.F. Martin, for example—we got down to the fundamental
question: What is it about guitars that makes them appealing? For guitar buyers,
there are three factors: performance, celebrity, and aesthetics. In other words, how it
plays, who plays it, and how it looks. Our criteria were essentially the same:
Historical “performance”: These guitars could be prototypes, “workhorse”
production models, or even evolutionary dead ends, but they have played an
important role in guitar history or music history.
Celebrity: Guitars would be nothing without the artists who played them, of
course. The Les Paul wouldn’t be the Les Paul without Page, Allman, and Slash.
Aesthetics: This is the “cool” factor, the “wow” factor, exemplified by
the scrolled body bout of a Gibson Style O Artist, the violin features of a
Wilkanowski, or the Foam Green custom-color finish on a Fender Bass VI.
Few guitars were as easy to agree on as Tampa Red’s National Style 4 tricone,
which qualifies for all three criteria. In most cases, a guitar that qualified under only
one criterion did not make the final cut. For example, there is no pristine example
of a Martin herringbone D-28, which would qualify as a model of immense histori-
cal importance. The two herringbone D-28s that we did include have even greater
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appeal: one is a very early example of the model (when it was still called a D-2) that
was used by radio star Arkie, the Arkansas Woodchopper, and the other was played by
country music legend Hank Williams Sr. Similarly, our representative Gibson L-5 is nei-
ther the rare, highly collectible early version with a label signed by designer Lloyd Loar,
nor the late-1930s 17-inch cutaway version that many big-band guitarists played, but a
refinished 1928 L-5 played by “Mother” Maybelle Carter.
The musicians who played guitars in the 1700s and 1800s played for the same
reasons they do now—to be seen and heard. It follows that if you admire guitars of
any particular style or era, you admire all guitars. That’s why The Guitar Collection
features a guitar made in 1700 by renowned violinmaker Antonio Stradivari as well as
a pawnshop Mustang played by Kurt Cobain. That’s why a 1902 archtop guitar made
by Orville Gibson (the inventor of the archtop genre) belongs in the same book with
a 1963 National electric guitar with a green fiberglass body shaped like a map of the
United States.
While the collection is impressive as a whole, each guitar in The Guitar Collection
can also stand on its own. Each instrument is a vignette from guitar history that opens
a doorway. Each could launch a chapter in a book or, in many cases, an entire book.
Taken together, the vignettes in The Guitar Collection tell a fascinating story. It’s a
story with diverse “plot lines,” from carved tops to metal resonators to solid bodies,
and a cast of interesting characters ranging from C.F. Martin to Slash, from Stradivari
to Clapton, all connected by one common thread—a passion for the guitar.
—walter carter
ThE GUITARs

Stradivarius “The Rawlins”
| From the collection of the National Music Museum, The University of South Dakota, Vermillion |
Made in 1700
The most celebrated violin maker of all time, Antonio Stradivari of Cremona, Italy, made at least
four guitars. Unlike the violin, which reached its pinnacle of design in Stradivari’s hands, the
guitar was only midway through its evolutionary journey in 1700, when this Stradivarius guitar
was built.
The Rawlins, named for the benefactors who acquired it for the National Music Museum,
has an ancestral relation to the lute that is apparent in this instrument’s courses of paired
strings—a configuration that would prevail on the modern mandolin but would disappear on the
guitar around 1800. However, the hourglass body shape, with a waist delineating upper and
lower bouts, distinguished even the earliest guitars of the mid 1500s from the pear-shaped lute.
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Like virtually all Stradivarius violins, this guitar has been modified. The embedded ebony
frets are highly suspect in an era when guitars typically had tied-on gut frets, and these frets
are not in the correct positions. The scale length of more than 29 inches is so long that gut
strings would break before they could be tuned up to standard pitch.
The prominent name and date on the back of the headstock, the too-long scale, and the
misplaced frets suggest that this instrument may have been made to showcase Stradivari’s
artisanship rather than to be played.

gibson j-45
| From the collection of michael J. malone |
Made circa 1944 and played by buddy holly
Buddy Holly was always seen onstage with a Fender Stratocaster, but offstage this Gibson
J-45 was his main guitar, as indicated by the heavy pick wear around the sound hole. Inspired
by the leather covering that Elvis Presley used on a Martin D-28, Holly made his own tooled-
leather covering for the J-45, featuring the titles of his 1956 Decca recordings “Love Me” and
“Blue Days Black Nights” along with his home state of Texas.
Holly’s J-45 was made during World War II, a period in which Gibson put a decal on the
headstock proclaiming “Only a Gibson Is Good Enough.” Wartime metal shortages limited
Gibson’s guitar production, and by 1944 the company could not procure the material for the
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adjustable truss rod, which had been used in the neck of virtually every Gibson since the
company patented the invention in 1921. As indicated by the lack of a truss-rod cover on
the headstock of Holly’s guitar, Gibson made some guitars toward the end of the war with-
out the adjustable rod in the neck.
After only eighteen months in the spotlight, Holly died at age twenty-two in a plane crash
on February 3, 1959. His influence on rock and roll remains strong, and the J-45 remains the
flagship model of Gibson’s dreadnought line.

Elektro A-25 “Frying Pan”
| From the collection of Bobby Carlos, courtesy of the Museum of Making Music |
Made circa 1932
The company known as Rickenbacker had identity problems in its first year of existence. It
started as Ro-Pat-In in 1932 with the brand name Electro, then switched to the Electro String
Instrument company with the brand name Rickenbacker (or Rickenbacher, as the 1930s
headstock decals said). This guitar, one of the earliest known examples of Ro-Pat-In’s original
electric Hawaiian guitar, illustrates the state of confusion with the brand name Elektro—with
a k—engraved into the headstock.
Aside from the brand name, this guitar is easily identifiable as Electro/Rickenbacker’s
famous Frying Pan model. Officially, it was the A-25. The number refers to the scale length of
25 inches; the company also offered the A-22, with a 22-inch scale.
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As this guitar shows, the company immediately abandoned the wood-bodied design
of its prototype in favor of a one-piece cast-aluminum unit. Hawaiian-style guitarists had no
problem with its nontraditional shape or its inelegant nickname, as they embraced the extra
volume provided by the distinctive horseshoe-magnet pickup.
Although the Frying Pan would soon be overshadowed in the Rickenbacker line by a new
Hawaiian model made from another nontraditional material—thermoplastic Bakelite—this
pioneering model would remain in production essentially unchanged for twenty-five years.

bigsby
| From the collection of the Country Music Hall of Fame and museum |
Made in 1948 and played by merle travis
Through a career that spanned from the 1930s to the 1980s, influential finger-picking guitarist
Merle Travis played many recognizable instruments, from a gaudy Guild archtop to a Martin
flat-top with a Bigsby neck. Of all those guitars, his most important was this solidbody model
made by Paul Bigsby in 1948, predating the earliest Fender solidbody guitars by two years.
Bigsby, based in the Los Angeles suburb of Downey, was better known as a motorcycle
enthusiast than a guitar maker when Travis gave him a drawing of a guitar and asked, “You can
make anything, right?” Bigsby’s famous reply: “Any damn thing.”
The headstock, with all six tuners on the same side, was designed by Travis to provide
a straight-line string pull and inspired by the European instruments of the 1800s (including
196
the earliest Stauffer-style guitars of C.F. Martin). The Bigsby would in turn inspire Fender’s
headstock design. The body originally had no cutaway, but Bigsby added it soon after the
guitar was completed. The ornamental pieces are Bigsby’s design, inspired by the armrests
on banjos.
Though Bigsby is often cited as the true father of the solidbody guitar, the honor comes
with qualification. The back plate covers a heavily routed body, but the routing is for weight
relief and does not alter the guitar’s functionality as a solidbody.

Made in 1953 and played by keith richards
Fender Telecaster Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones usually played Gibsons throughout the 1960s, but in
1971 he bought this 1953 Telecaster. After a series of modifications, this guitar, nicknamed
Micawber after a character in Charles Dickens’s David Copperfield, became one of his favor-
“Micawber”
ite and most famous instruments.
The most important alteration is the most obvious—the neck pickup. Richards brought
some of his familiar Gibson sound to the Fender by replacing the original single-coil pickup
with a Gibson humbucker. He replaced the bridge pickup, too, but with a similar unit from a
| From the collection of keith richards | Fender lap steel.
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Richards tuned this guitar to an open G chord, and because he did not use the lowest
string, he removed it, making it a five-string. He replaced the Tele’s standard three-segment
saddles with a brass bridge plate featuring an adjustable saddle for each string, and he
removed the unneeded sixth-string saddle. The tuners have also been replaced.
Richards would buy several more Telecasters and set them up with humbuckers, but he
continued to rely heavily on Micawber, as evidenced by the wear and tear on the body.
His heavy strumming has worn through the finish on the body and the end of the neck,
and has caused one of the black fingerboard markers to pop out.

Made circa 1956–1957 and played by eric clapton
Fender Stratocaster In 1970, on a break from filming the Johnny Cash TV show at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium,
Eric Clapton walked around the corner to a guitar shop, Sho-Bud, where he bought a half-
“Blackie”
dozen vintage Fender Stratocasters and parts. Clapton then put a black-finished body from
1957—a date confirmed by the serial number on the neck plate and by the single-ply white
pickguard (which would be replaced in 1959 by a multi-ply unit)—together with a maple neck
of about the same age (most later necks would have a rosewood fingerboard).
Blackie (as he dubbed the guitar) replaced Clapton’s 1956 Strat, Brownie, and Clap-
| From the collection of guitar center | ton used it extensively for almost fifteen years, as shown by the heavy finish wear on the
240
body and the cigarette burns in the headstock. Along the way, Clapton and bandmember
Albert Lee began calling themselves the Fabulous Duck Brothers—Clapton was Peking
Duck and Lee was Bombay Duck—and Clapton’s crew stenciled “The Duck Bros.” on
Blackie’s road case.
Blackie was the star attraction at a 2004 auction to benefit the Crossroads Centre in
Antigua, an addiction treatment facility founded by Clapton. The Guitar Center retail chain
paid a then-record $959,500 for Blackie and immediately commissioned a limited-edition
replica from Fender, complete with the Duck Bros. case.

gibson flying v
“number 7”
| From the collection of lonnie mack |
Made in 1958 and played by lonnie mack
Lonnie Mack, a 17-year-old country guitarist from southern Indiana, was probably not one
of the target customers for Gibson’s new, modernistic Flying V model of 1958, but in Mack’s
hands, the Flying V became an icon of rock music.
Mack bought the seventh Flying V made by Gibson from Glen Hughes Music in Cincin-
nati, and he soon asked the store to install a Bigsby vibrato. The store had to bend a strip of
metal to mount the Bigsby to the guitar’s unconventional body.
An ancient capo has left its marks on the back of the neck, revealing the original light-
brown shade of the Korina wood (African limba). Mack painted his guitar purple and then
286
had the Sho-Bud company of Nashville refinish it in cherry red (removing the original serial
number and the headstock logo) to match Gibson’s SG models of the 1960s. The white nylon
saddles of the Tune-o-matic bridge are also replacement parts from the 1960s.
Mack used this guitar on his 1963 hit “Memphis.” The record introduced his self-described
“roadhouse” style to a national audience and revived interest in a model that Gibson had
abandoned. Moreover, Mack and his Flying V created a blueprint for the blues-influenced guitar
style that would become modern rock and roll.

Gretsch White Penguin
| From the Bachman Gretsch collection of Gretsch Guitars |
Made in 1955
The White Penguin was one of only two Gretsch solidbody models (the Chet Atkins being the
other) to have counterparts in the hollowbody line. The Penguin was the solidbody equivalent
of the White Falcon, sharing such appointments as engraved fingerboard inlays, a “Cadillac”-
style tailpiece, and gold-sparkle binding. Even the winglike ornaments on the headstock—
appropriate for a falcon but not so much for a penguin—were dutifully copied. In typical
Gretsch fashion for the period, the serial number was scratched onto the back control plate.
The line drawing of a squat, upright bird on the pickguard posed the question that Gretsch
never answered: Why would anyone name a guitar after a penguin?
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Sightings of the Penguin were rare, even in Gretsch literature. It appeared only in a 1958
flyer and a 1959 price list. At $490 it was more than $100 higher than any other solidbody, but
still more than $100 cheaper than the White Falcon.
Production of the White Penguin is estimated at only a dozen. At one point in the early
1990s, it was a Penguin—not a Gibson sunburst Les Paul—that set a record price for the sale of
an electric guitar. It remains one of the most highly sought “rare birds” in the vintage guitar world.

Gibson EDS-1275
| From the collection of JIMMY PAGE |
Made in 1971 and played by JIMMY PAGE
On Led Zeppelin’s classic “Stairway to Heaven,” Jimmy Page used an acoustic Harmony
guitar, a Fender Telecaster, and a Fender electric twelve-string. That made it impossible to
recreate the recording in live performances, where Page was limited to one guitar at a time.
However, he found a partial solution in Gibson’s EDS-1275 double-neck, which allowed him to
switch from six strings to twelve strings without changing guitars.
Gibson’s double-neck model started off in the late 1950s with a unique hollowbody carved-
top design, but when Gibson transformed the Les Paul line to the pointed-horn SG body style
in 1961, the double-neck models followed suit. The lighter body weight of the SG design made
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the EDS-1275 more comfortable to play than the earlier version. Due to increased popularity,
what had been a custom-order model became a regular production guitar.
Page replaced the humbucking pickups on the six-string side of his EDS-1275 with
coverless Seymour Duncan units, but otherwise this is the stock production model—despite
the “Custom” inscription on the truss-rod covers.
Gibson stopped offering the EDS-1275 in 1969—this guitar was special-ordered in 1971—
but thanks to its use by Page (and later by Slash of Guns N’ Roses), demand for double-
necks did not go away. Gibson revived the model in 1977, and it remains in production today.

Fender Stratocaster
| From the collection of Experience Music Project |
Made in 1968 and played by jimi hendrix
No guitar represents a greater convergence of artist, event, and instrument than this 1968
Fender Stratocaster played by Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock.
Taken alone, the instrument is rather unremarkable. For starters, it was made during
CBS’s ownership of Fender, a period of declining quality. It’s a stock right-handed Stratocaster
with Olympic White finish. Although the maple fingerboard appears to be integral with the
neck, as it was on 1950s Fenders, it is actually separate; the giveaway is on the back
of the neck, where there is no evidence of the walnut “skunk stripe” that is present on all
Fender one-piece necks. Hendrix played left-handed, but rather than special-ordering a
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lefty, he simply flipped the guitar over and reversed the strings, so that the heavier bass
strings would be on what is normally the treble side.
Although the Strat had some degree of notoriety in rock and roll music, thanks to Buddy
Holly and the surf bands, it was overshadowed in the Fender line in the early-to-mid 1960s by
the more expensive Jazzmaster.
The film Woodstock featured Hendrix’s screaming, pyrotechnic version of “The Star-
Spangled Banner,” which set the course for the future of rock guitar and instantly raised the
Stratocaster to the iconic status that it enjoys today.

Les Paul Standard copy
| From the collection of slash |
Made in 1986 and played by slash
With the release of Guns N’ Roses’ Appetite for Destruction in 1987, the band’s guitarist,
Slash, emerged as one of the most influential guitarists of the 1980s and ’90s, with a style—
and a guitar—that harkened back to the classic blues-based rockers of the 1960s.
Ironically, this vintage-looking Les Paul—the one Slash used on Appetite for Destruction—
is not a Gibson. It is a replica made by Kris Derrig of MusicWorks, a guitar store located in
Redondo Beach, California. The top, like those of the most sought-after original Les Pauls,
features highly figured book-matched maple, but with no cherry tint around the edges of the
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top. The serial number is ink-stamped in the style of a 1959 Gibson, but the neck profile is
actually that of a ’58. The special sound of this guitar comes from a pair of Seymour Duncan
Alnico II humbuckers with black-and-white “zebra” coils and some vintage electronics that the
maker had in his shop.
Despite the fact that Slash’s favorite Les Paul was a replica, his influence on sales of real
Gibson Les Pauls was so great that Gibson welcomed him as an endorser and in 2010 intro-
duced a replica of this replica as the Slash Appetite for Destruction Les Paul.