Vintage Guitar Conversions Proliferate
Profit-driven brace-ectomies prolong the life of some vintage guitars,
but they also butcher the design integrity and reconfigure the sound.
In any case, we'll see more converted instruments in guitar markets
as long as luthiers, dealers and web vendors make money on them.
The Gentrification of Vintage Acoustic Guitars
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© 2015 — Kenneth Lelen — All Rights Reserved
References, Links, Author's Bio and Feedback at article's end
Feedback is continuously updated with Comments from experts
On a workbench in luthier David Sheppard's Mt. Airy NC shop is what he calls "the cleanest maple-bodied Kalamazoo," a pre-war KGN-12 guitar he's converting from ladder-braced guitar to X-braced for a San Francisco client. Among other repair jobs this year, his conversions, using a private stash of spruce bracing and 30 years of repair skills, include a 1930s KG-11 and 1960s LG-0.
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Photo: Ken Lelen
Luthier David Sheppard and 1952 Kay K-20 super grand auditorium.
Purchased at Guitar Center in Orlando FL for $500, I paid Sheppard
$900 in October, 2007 to convert it from ladder-braced to x-braced. |
He recently traveled to Greensboro NC to meet with a man for whom he converted a Gibson Oriole 15 years ago.
"He suggested the conversion to x-brace on that guitar, which had suffered severe water damage and other problems," Sheppard recalls. "He also started suggesting [my] conversions to other people," which led to both client and spec conversions on top of other repair work.
As a result, Sheppard estimates he has completed 100 to 150 conversions since 1999. "I never set out to start doing conversions in large numbers," he says. "It was more accidental, but I pretty regularly get conversions in here to do."
Conversion candidates: old, abused, unused and broken guitars
Today, dealers, web vendors and entrepreneurial luthiers are busy converting vintage ladder-braced guitars in good, bad and middling shape into pricey hybrids with x-braced tops. If the opportunity arises, they also will replace and rebrace the tops of vintage Gibsons and Martins notable for their crushed, cracked or absent tops, bashed-in sides and backs, busted necks, warped fingerboards and less-than-pristine finishes.
Other guitars ripe for conversion include gut-string, fan-braced, birch-body, parlor, classical and arch-tops. Upon completion, these faux-vintage guitars are placed on retail walls and websites with tags extolling them as the guitar world's second coming. I'll spare you the unctuous verbosity about tone, sustain, power, playability, etc.
Of suspect heritage, they may look like their x-braced brethren, but they don't embody original design, material or musical character. As important, they don't sound like vintage guitars, whether ladder-braced, fan-braced, H-braced or x-braced.
Converted guitars are an alien species I call brace-ectomies. Some are priced at or below vintage prices, which dealers say attract buyers. Others, depending on profit margins and repair-job economics, are priced higher and suggestively called "restored" or "unique." In any case, once converted, these instruments compete for a player's money in a forest of vintage sound-alikes.
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Conversion Candidates Vintage Victims
Ladder-brace to X-brace — Gibson KG-14, KG-11, KGN-12, GS-5, LG-0
— 1910s parlor, 1920s Stella, 1930s Harmony
Fan-brace to X-brace — Gibson GS-85 and GS-35 to faux LG-2
Retop archtop to flattop — 1930s Martin C-2 to OM, F-7 to 000-42
— Gibson L-30, L-37 and L-50 become L-00
Hawaiian-style to Spanish — Gibson HG-00, Martin 00-40H, B&D S2H
Square neck to round neck — recarve or reneck Smeck, Oahu, Bronson
Rebraced to steel strings — gut-string Martin and parlor guitars
Plain to scalloped braces — 1950s Martin D-28 to match 1930 specs
Retopping damaged tops — Martin 00-28G, 000-28C and factory work
6-string to 12-string — Stella grand concert to faux Lead Belly
Trapeze to pin bridge — 1930s Gibson L-2 or Nick Lucas
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Profit and tone, not originality, driving conversions
"I have mixed feelings about conversions," says the grand poobah of vintage guitars, George Gruhn of Gruhn Guitars in Nashville TN. In his purview of vintage conversions are ladder-braced to x-braced, arched-top to flat-top, gut-string to steel-string, square-neck to round-neck and Hawaiian-style to standard guitars.
"My first concern is respect for originality of the instrument," Gruhn says. Converting a Kalamazoo KG-14 into a budget-priced L-00 "may not be worth the labor cost," he adds. "It's time consuming to do it right and building [a new guitar] can be quicker than repairs."
So, why are there so many vintage conversions in guitar markets today? "While most haven't been done well, dealers and luthiers are looking to maximize their return," Gruhn says.
Conversions occur because guitar markets are "still about tone, not just collectibility," says luthier Mark Stutman of Folkway Music, a dealer in Waterloo, Ontario. "People want a guitar they can play and sounds good."
People are reticent
to convert vintage Martin archtops in good condition, Stutman says. Yet,
"C-2s with smunched tops are no longer collectable and become good
candidates for conversion, a process that costs a bare minimum of
$3,500" in repairs, he says.
In 2014 Stutman converted a 1932 Martin C-2 with damaged top into an OM and listed the completed guitar at $12,500. "Even though rarer than the OMs, there isn't a strong demand for these archtop models," he said. "If re-topped with a flat top they can be the next best thing to an original OM."
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Photos: Folkway Music
Luthier Mark Stutman converted a 1932 Martin C-2 round-hole archtop guitar with a
damaged top and crack-free rosewood body by affixing a red spruce flattop (below)
with maple bridge plate and dimensioned braces he copied from a 1929 Martin OM. |
Raping a piece of history
Vintage Martin archtops don't draw as much money or market interest as vintage Martin flattops. This price discrepancy and limited supply of vintage rosewood bodies opened a door for speculative work, which calls for tricky neck resets, new tops and bracing, new necks, wider fingerboards and high-cost labor for archtop-to-flattop conversions.
Pricey and profitably altered instruments, unique in the market, appeared between 1964 and 1967. That's when luthiers Marc Silber, Mario Martello and Eugene Clark in California and dealer Matt Umanov of Umanov Guitars in New York City converted F-9 and F-7 archtops into flattops.
Today, converting vintage Martin archtops captivates several well-known luthiers, from T.J. Thompson, Howard Klepper and David Musselwhite to John Arnold, Dennis Berck and Chris Berkov and others. I vividly remember my first visit to Thompson's former shop in West Concord MA. There, on the walls of the former mill, were a dozen sunburst tops removed from vintage Martin archtops and mounted like zebra pelts, lion heads and other big-game trophies.
"Today, pristine C-2s from the 1930s are worth $6,000 to $6,500," says Alex Whitman of T.R. Crandall Guitars in New York City. "They often don't sound great, about as good as the cheapest archtop Gibson, but we can take a guitar like that people are willing to pay for and make it part vintage, part new."
There's money in Hawaiian and square-neck conversions as well. "Hawaiian guitars were tremendously popular in the 1930s, but no one plays that style today," Whitman says. "So, when we do a conversion, we make it more valuable and a customer will pay for [that job]."
When performed correctly, Martin Hawaiian conversion jobs can cost $1,500, according to Gruhn, while converting a 21/4-inch wide, square-neck Gibson Hawaiian to a round-neck standard-style guitar can cost up to $2,000 in labor.
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Photo: Vintage Instruments
1937 Gibson Roy Smeck Stage DeLuxe (FON n.a.) with spruce top in sunburst
finish, 12-fret dreadnought mahogany body. It was converted (luthier n.a.) from a
square-neck to round-neck. Priced at $7,500 by Vintage Instruments, which says
it got a "proper neck reset" and a compensated saddle, while the mahogany neck
was "very nicely reduced in size" to 1-13/16-in. nut width and "finished so well
most will not notice it." |
"You have to deal with the flat fingerboard, flush frets, re-set the neck and re-slot the saddle," Gruhn says. "Even if you're good enough to do all that, what's the top price you can charge [in the market]?" Gruhn asks. "You may be raping a piece of history that's not worth the money."
Stutman, who has converted "a fair number" of vintage guitars, agrees it's difficult to locate luthiers who are sensitive to the delicate design decisions, material trade-offs and cost factors that consume vintage conversions.
"Very few conversions are done properly because they are a lot of work to do," says Stutman, who this winter has a client's 1931 Gibson L-2 on his bench awaiting conversion from trapeze to pin bridge, neck reset and some tough decisions about bridge plate repairs.
Prolonging life of vintage instruments
Not all vintage experts share Gruhn's view that conversions violate a piece of history. Sheppard, for one, believes his work brings otherwise unplayed and unplayable guitars back to life and utility, even as they suit players and budgets.
"We're talking about guitars, functional pieces of craftmanship," he says. "They were made to play music. It is my impression were [these conversions] not done, [the guitars] would not be played."
The sound of an unconverted, ladder-braced guitar has "no appeal to me," Sheppard adds. "It's a personal thing, like the difference between an OM Martin and a short-scale Martin. You either like them or not."
Conversions occur because dealers see value in doing the work and more luthiers to do the work. "Conversion work is like repairs, which is a big part of our business," says Whitman. "We have a big backlog of repairs."
If you own a ladder-braced flattop guitar, conversion currently costs $800 to $1,000 for the luthier. A job often includes removing a guitar back to access the top braces, replacing the braces, resetting the neck and set-up. The luthier may also deal with repair issues, restoring the binding, replacing a pickguard and finish touch-ups.
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Photo: Vintage Licks
The business end of a converted guitar top.
Like tan lines on a naked body, the outline of the original lateral bracing is visible
under new bracing and tone bars installed by luthier David Hatchard for Vintage
Licks on a 1939 Gibson (EW-760) Recording King Carson J Robison Model K
Jumbo (1052). |
Converting guitars today, like refinishing guitars in years past, can be lucrative work for luthiers, says Richard Johnston of Gryphon Stringed Instruments in Palo Alto CA. "Years ago, if we refinished the top an early 1940s Martin 000-28, it was worth considerable more," he recalls. "We had bills to pay and if someone came to us asking for a refin, we'd do it.
"But I wonder if this conversion work might lead us to say, 'If only we knew then what we know now,' because stuff we did in the past may now be considered butchery."
The public's perspective on what you can and cannot do to a vintage instrument and what work makes economic sense to a dealer have changed as well, Johnston says. "Guitar fashion turns so often I wonder if conversions make sense. In our shop a 1950s Gibson LG-1 in good condition, fully playable, can sell for more than an LG-1 conversion, so conversion doesn't increase its value."
Justifying the conversion of unsellable guitars
Saying a conversion candidate is undesirable or unplayable and a conversion will re-establish or lengthen its utility are disingenuous characterizations, one guitar expert says. It leads to deceptive justifications and convenient alibis for repairing guitars that are not broken.
"I can see why you'd want to fix unusable guitars, but why not just get what you want in the first place instead of x-bracing ones that have lateral bracing," says Stella guru Neil Harpe of Annapolis MD.
"People are ruining perfectly good Kalamazoos," he says. "You don't have a Kalamazoo or a Gibson. A converted Kalamazoo is a faux Gibson. A converted Martin Hawaiian is an ego trip for guys who want a 00-45 but can't afford it."
Vintage guitars with bashed-in tops, broken necks, missing braces and body cracks are repairable, insists Harpe. "You want them playable, not sitting in a case, but you don't have to destroy historic design or sound."
As evidence, Harpe points to recent work on a Gibson Nick Lucas guitar from the late 1920s. It contained modified fan bracing and a bridge plate, but was rife with top cracks. "It was coming apart at the seams, a train wreck," he says.
Annapolis luthier Jim Cunngingham made a mold for the body and repaired the cracks. The cost: more than $1,000. "It's a rare guitar, historically significant, but we didn't replace the top or convert the bracing." Harpe says.
Ample supply of conversion-ready guitars
The rise in vintage conversions reflects a drive by dealers to wrest profit from under-utilized older guitars. Adding fuel to this fire is the fact that unconverted Kalamazoos in good condition are as ample today as 15 years ago.
"Gibson made a shit-load of KG-14s and KG-11s in the 1930s and you can still find them in decent condition," Sheppard says. "Most of what I convert are things no one else could play, so there's a lot of Kalamazoos that wouldn't get played otherwise."
Stutman agrees. "There's no shortage of pristine Kalamazoos," he says. "They're not rare and no one's offended if they're converted."
Asking prices on ladder-braced Kalamazoos "have started to bring more money," says Sheppard, "about $1,200, $1,400 and $1,600 for unconverted guitars, while it costs another $800 for a typical KG-14 conversion."
Indeed, asking prices on unconverted Kalamazoos in good shape are higher than ever, according to recent data. In January, 2015, 12 unconverted KG-11s averaged $2,020, while 10 unconverted KG-14s averaged $2,303.
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Asking prices (Jan., 2015) on 12 KG-11s:
$1,100 at Antebellum Instruments;
$1,795 at Vintage Blues Guitars;
$1,800 and $1,800 at Vintage Mandolin HQ;
$1,850 at Guitar Exchange;
$1,850 and $2,400 at Willie's American Guitars;
$1,999 at T.R. Crandall;
$1,900 and $2,300 at Vintage Licks;
$2,500 and $2,950 at Atomic Guitars.
$2,020 - average for unconverted KG-11
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Asking prices (Jan., 2015) on 10 KG-14s:
$1,700 at Kentucky Vintage Guitars;
$1,450 at Mass Street Music;
$1,999, $2,195 and $2,495 at Rivington Guitars;
$2,000 and $2,000 at Atomic Guitars;
$2,799 at T.R. Crandall;
$2,895 at Umanov Guitars;
$3,500 at Vintage Licks.
$2,303 - average for unconverted KG-14
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With average asking prices on unconverted Kalamazoos ranging from $2,020 to $2,303, converting them may not be worth the trouble and cost, posits Whitman. "They still sound somewhat like a Kalamazoo and we wouldn't make money on [the conversion] by raising the value," he says.
Indeed, the economics of conversion may not work as well today as ten years ago, says North Carolina dealer Jim Craddock. "I can't hardly find [unconverted guitars] priced at $500, let alone find someone willing to re-do the braces so I can still sell them for $1,500," he says.
Converted guitars at "half the price" of original x-braced guitars
While unconverted Kalamazoo prices are rising, buyers may still find a converted Kalamazoo akin to an L-00 for $2,500, according to Sheppard. "This is still half the price of a regular x-braced L-00," he says.
How does Sheppard's price point on hybrid Kalamazoos contrast with prices on original x-braced L-00s? Data show asking prices on 19 L-00 guitars averaged $4,552 in January, 2015, so his estimate of "half the price" is not far off.
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Asking prices (Jan., 2015) on 19 L-00s:
$3,499 at Willie's American Guitars;
$3,900 at Lark Street;
$4,000, $4,000, $4,200, $4,750, $3,800 at Vintage Instruments;
$4,250 at KY Vintage Guitars;
$4,699 and $4,999 at T.R. Crandall;
$4,750, $5,800, $4,000, $4,000 and $6,000 at Musurgia;
$5,250, $3,650 and $3,950 at Vintage Mandolin HQ;
$6,995 at Umanov.
$4,552 - average for original x-braced L-00
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Still, it's hard to compare prices on hybrid guitars to their original x-braced flattop or archtop cousins due to the differences created by the conversion work and the resulting differences in market values.
However, just for fun, here are recent dealer listings on two converted Gibson flattops, one converted Gibson archtop, a pair of converted Oscar Schmidt birch-body guitars and three converted Martin archtops.
1932 Gibson L-00 (FON n.a.) Top replaced and x-braced with new black lacquer finish by luthier David Sheppard, with original bindings, bridge and white pickguard. Priced at $3,250 by Vintage Instruments, which called the guitar "in excellent restored condition" and its sound as "a combination of a Gibson L-00 and Collings C10."
1934 Gibson archtop (FON n.a.) Converted from L-50 to L-00 in July, 2009 by luthier James Burkett, who used the original sunburst mahogany body, then installed a new neck and repro headstock logo and x-braced red spruce top (supplied by luthier John Arnold) in a repro sunburst finish with replica pickguard. Priced at $3,450 by Picker's Supply.
1931 Gibson Nick Lucas (FON n.a.) Converted from trapeze tailpiece and adjustable bridge to straight rosewood pin bridge by luthier Tom Crandall, with original rosewood back and sides, Cremona sunburst finish, elevated pickguard. Priced at $25,000 by Vintage Instruments.
1930 Oscar Schmidt Galiano (left)
Back in the day this 13½-in. wide birch-body Galiano with 24-7/8-in. scale was played as lap-style. Played today as a standard-style guitar, it is priced at $1,199 by Vintage Blues Guitars, which says the "neck, frets and fingerboard show very little playing wear" and fingerboard retains the "oft-seen numbering on the frets."
1935 Oscar Schmidt Stella (above right)
A lap-style, birch-body Oscar Schmidt guitar with 26½-in. scale, big wide neck, 14-7/8-in. wide body and spruce top. It was converted to standard play for guitarist Norman Blake from a 6-string to a 12-string faux Lead Belly for its "immense sound." Priced at $3,295 by Schoenberg Guitars, which employs a special brand of faux logic to say, "Since the 12-stringers are so rare, it makes a lot of sense to convert the 6-stringers, which are otherwise identical."
1934 Martin archtop (SN 57953) Converted from C-2 to 000-42 with a replacement ebony fingerboard and new Sitka spruce top with x-bracing and voicing by luthier Steve Hegelson. Priced at $13,500 by Steve Swan Guitars.
1935 Martin archtop (SN n.a.) Converted in 2009 from C-2 to 000-28 with new x-braced Carpathian spruce top by luthier Chris Berkov. It retains a 24.9-in. scale, original neck, and rosewood back and sides. It is priced at $12,499 by T.R. Crandall Guitars, which called it "A perfect guitar for anyone looking for a prewar Brazilian rosewood Martin for a fraction [of] the price of an all original 000-28."
1935 Martin archtop (SN n.a.) F-7 received a five-star job by luthier David Musselwhite. Work included installing a new x-braced spruce top in shaded finish, old-style pickguard and pearl trim, reuse of the original rosewood body, installation of new neck and ivory nut (due to original's cracked headstock), fingerboard with 42-style inlays, ebony bridge with ivory saddle and fossilized ivory bridge pins, gold-plated Grover G-98 tuners and rosewood headplate with replica Martin decal. Priced at $19,950 by Jet City, which says the guitar has the "articulation, clarity and warmth of a 000-42, volume and bottom end of a D-28, and tremendous sustain of both." It's "a great choice" for a buyer trying to "decide between a rare vintage instrument and one by a quality modern builder."
Why fret about vintage guitar conversions?
As a musician who has played acoustic guitar for 52 years, I was initially attracted to converted guitars for the nuanced sound, vintage-but-new appeal and modest prices.
I owned six converted guitars between Fall, 2006 and Spring, 2014. They included four ladder-braced spec conversions bought at guitar shows and retail shops: 1934 Gibson L-50 for $3,450; 1938 Gibson KG-12 for $2,200; 1939 Tonk Fascinator B for $650; 1940 Gibson GS-85 for $2,000.
They also included two commissioned conversions from David Sheppard: 1938 Gibson fan-braced GS-35 ($2,995 for guitar, $900 to convert); 1952 Kay ladder-braced super grand auditorium ($500 for guitar, $900 to convert).
In time, usually from a month to a year, I fell out of love with each guitar, its playing mechanics or sound. Some needed new frets, radiused fingerboards or neck re-set to play properly. Each needed additional set-up work to match my flatpicking play-style.
A few didn't supply the mid-range honk I loved on vintage ladder-braced guitars. Some did not have the warm sustain I loved on x-braced guitars I've owned. The Fascinator and Kay, both birch-bodied guitars, were the most disappointing and easiest to let go.
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James Burkett's conversion of
1934 Gibson L-50 to faux L-00 |
In short, I soured on vintage guitar conversions, even James Burkett's 1934 Gibson archtop hybrid, which weds vintage mahogany back and sides with an x-braced spruce top in sunburst finish, new neck and fingerboard. He created a faux L-00 tone beast with a glowing, bright tone and bullet-fast neck.
Shown at left, it is a gorgeous instrument that cleverly marries the best of old elements with the best new materials. It is not one at day's end that sounds and plays and lives and breathes like a vintage guitar.
Sometimes I fantasize about converting a cheap Kalamazoo, thinking, "Oh, what's the harm?" But then reality sets in, and I've concluded the best advice for someone about to convert a ladder-braced guitar may be the old medical chestnut: "First, do no harm."
I'm also reminded of what luthier David LaPlante of Selkirk NY told members of the Unofficial Martin Guitar Forum, an online listserv, in January, 2010. LaPlante, who has been building one-of-a-kind classical guitars as well as restoring or building vintage Martins since 1966, said:
In general I think it's a
big mistake to expect or modify an antique
guitar to perform to modern standards.
Comparing historic vintage
guitars to modern ones as if they were meant to compete misses
the point. Vintage guitars are an acquired taste.
One needs to accept
functional shortcomings and enjoy the aesthetic and
realize that they
may not satisfy the demands of some players.
I believe in most cases it's wiser to preserve an instrument as it is, repair it if need be, or just walk away. Don't proceed with a brace-ectomy just because you can find a luthier who will do the job for you.
Lest it go unpaid, hybrid instruments are an infection on vintage guitar markets that won't vanish. They are an acquired taste that guitar players will continue to sample. And, with this article, I want them to know what they're getting into.
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Dealer References Website Links
Antebellum Instruments, Rochester VT antebelluminstruments.blogspot.com
Atomic Guitars, Southampton NY gbase.com
Crandall Guitars, New York NY trcrandall.com
Folkway Music, Waterloo ONT folkwaymusic.com
Gruhn Guitars, Nashville TN gruhn.com
Gryphon Stringed Instruments, Palo Alto CA gryphonstrings.com
Guitar Exchange, Baltimore MD gbase.com
Jet City Guitars, Seattle WA jetcityguitars.com
Kentucky Vintage Guitars, Lexington KY gbase.com
Kovacik Guitars, Scotia NY guitar-repair.com
Lark Street Music, Teaneck NJ larkstreetmusic.com
Mass Street Music, Lawrence KS massstreetmusic.com
N.Y. String Service, Brooklyn NY musurgia.com
Rivington Guitars, New York NY rivingtonguitars.com
Schoenberg Guitars, Tiburon CA om28.com
Sheppard Guitars, Mt Airy NC scbroadcaster.com
Stella Guitars, Annapolis MD stellaguitars.com
Steve Swan Guitars, Burlingame CA steveswanguitars.com
Umanov Guitars, New York NY umanovguitars.com
Vintage Instruments, Philadelphia PA vintage-instruments.com
Vintage Blues Guitars, Lititz PA vintagebluesguitars.com
Vintage Licks, Hampton Falls NH vintagelicksguitars.com
Vintage Mandolin HQ, Richmond VA vintagemandolin.com
Willie's Am Guitars, St Paul MN williesguitars.com
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Ken Lelen sings ragtime, jazz & swing and plays vintage acoustic guitars
at concerts for niche markets, diverse groups, special clients and sundry
venues across the East Coast. A journalist for 30 years before launching
Vintage Music Concerts, he's played acoustic guitar since summer, 1963.
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© 2015 — Kenneth Lelen - All Rights Reserved
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Feedback
Comments are edited for brevity & clarity
Well written, but in my
case, preaching to a choirboy! All true! I have a RK Carson Robison Model K
12-fret Hawaiian guitar that is having some work done on it, so I guess in a
sense I am “guilty as charged.” I’m replacing the high nut so it can be played
Spanish style, having the neck re-set
and carbon-fiber rod installed in the poplar neck. However, I'm not messing
with saddle, bridge, braces, frets, machines, etc. .... nothing other than the
nut. So it will be essentially the same as it left the factory. — Neil Harpe, Stella Guitars, Annapolis MD
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Interesting and well written. Thank
you. — George Gruhn, GruhnGuitars, Nashville TN
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You may have
seen my comments on UMGF whenever a Gibson Smeck is mentioned with a
thinned neck or a re-braced Carson Robison Jumbo. I've also been repeating
other's warnings on adding a pin bridge to a rosewood Nick Lucas.
I don't remember anyone thinning a neck on a Smeck and then not deciding to
sell it. — Robert Corwin,
Old Gibson, Philadelphia PA
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Not
a big fan of conversions. Maybe in certain cases, but it's kind of a shame to
mess with history, as there's only so many old instruments out there. — Dave Stearns, Guitar Gallery, Amherst, NH
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Only on a rare occasion
would I recommend a bracing change. You're not gonna make a 1938 Martin
out of a Kay guitar. It's just not a good way to proceed. Here's a story: a friend of mine took his newly
acquired 1970s D-18 to a well known dude who scallops bracing etc, and
claims to have GREAT results (making the guitar sound pre-war and stuff like
that). My friend played it for us and asked for an opinion on the sound. Our
honest answer was that it sounded like a 1970s Martin. End of story!! — Jeff Kline, J.B. Kline & Son, Lambertville NJ
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I just
sold a guitar to Neil Harpe through eBay. It's good to know he doesn't convert. I
agree with the idea of leaving them alone, but if the guitar has a damaged top I
really don't see the harm. I love the way that a Kalamazoo sounds all original.
Just as God and Gibson intended. Rebracing sure seems like an end run around purchase of a Martin or a Gibson L-00. — Val Rouse, Bob's Used Guitars, Ravenna OH
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It’s hard
for me to imagine a sinister techno-industrial vintage guitar behemoth driven
by profit motives to create these mangled children, but I’ll try. One of my
first personal vintage guitars was a converted 1934 Gibson Smeck Stage Deluxe. The
neck had been re-carved so it felt like a big L-7 or Jumbo neck. I was an
amazing guitar — if only it had two more frets clear of the body I’d have it
still. I bought it from Neil Harpe. My only regret was selling it. The guy you
didn’t talk to who does as many archtop conversions as anyone is luthier Joe Konkoly in Grand Ledge MI.
I just sent Dave Sheppard a little Carson Robison for
a conversion just to see what all the hubbub was about. The ladder-braced
department-store guitars can have all sorts of structural problems, but this one
has none of them … maybe a little too much belly behind the bridge. It didn’t play properly, so it also needs a neck reset. I did change the strings and play
it in open G for a while before packing it. I sent it to Dave with an email to
call me when it arrived because I wasn’t so sure I wanted to change the
bracing. It sounds pretty darned good the way it is. I think I’ll just have
Dave do a nice neck reset and maybe put in some taller frets for more “bite”.
But I want to talk to Dave first. — Jim Brown, Jet City Guitars, Seattle WA
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I've got mixed feelings
about conversions as well, and generally will only do them when the guitar in
question simply isn't viable as it was originally configured. For
example, Martin archtop and nylon string guitars — I'll only convert them if
some other calamity has already occurred that damaged the top beyond
repair. In such a case, it is economically unfeasible to re-top the
guitar (1960s Martin 00-28G) because of the relatively low demand for all
original examples and even lower demand for a retopped version in original
configuration. That's a guitar I'll convert because it will return the
guitar to viability and allow me to make money off the work that I wouldn't
make "restoring" the guitar to original specs.
Nevertheless, I feel like I'm
swimming upstream on this issue. Last year I bought a 1942 Martin F-2
archtop from the original owner. I bought it considering that probably the only way
to make money with the guitar was to convert it to flattop. The guitar had top
damage (big cracks), but nothing that couldn't be fixed, nothing that required
replacement. I held the guitar in my inventory for most of the past year
waiting for it to come up in line for the work, but as I did the idea of
ripping a good top off a very cool (albeit not very desirable or marketable) 70-year old guitar became less and less appealing, economic considerations be
damned.
In a quandary as to what to do with it (keep it? sell it as
is? convert it?), I knew full well that if I kept it the guitar would
stay an archtop. But that wasn't a compelling reason to leave my money sit in a
guitar I wouldn't play. I knew also that if I sold it the odds
were that whoever bought it would be buying it to convert. I sold it. Right at this very moment you can look in to this UMGF thread and
see that very same guitar being converted by luthier Howard Klepper. Too bad, but
not surprising. — Steve Kovacik, Kovacik Guitars, Scotia NY
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While we would never countenance adding built-in pickups or
cutaways to quality acoustic archtops, re-topping Martin archtops doesn't
bother us as much. In truth, Martin C, R, and F models were really mediocre
instruments as built, but they can be made into truly outstanding flattops.
From a purely musical standpoint, we see this as a win. While this may
seem heresy to purist collectors, we prefer to see instruments as musical tools
first and foremost, to be treated with respect always, but if they can be
intelligently improved in tone and playability, we see value added, not
subtracted No one seems to squawk much about installing a Quarterman aluminum cone
to improve the tone of an old Dobro. It's also worth noting that most all
Cremona violins from the 17th and 18th Centuries have had their necks splinted longer at
some point. They simply project better in a concert setting than the old short-scale fiddles. — Joe Vinikow, Achtop.com, Seattle, WA
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[Converting guitar bracing] is an interesting
question. Personally, I think a guitar is a guitar, old, new, whatever. Conversions are usually done on less than spectacular or damaged guitars, so why is it a big deal? The historical value of a
KG-11 is really pretty much nil. Some people play these guitars because they
like the sound of ladder-braced guitars, but they're in the vast minority. No
ladder-braced guitar compares with a comparable x-braced one. As for the ego trip of a Hawaiian conversion to 00-42 or whatever, I find that super fancy
guitars are more worry than they are worth. I have the fanciest guitar Frankie Montuoro ever made, and I'm literally afraid to play it.
The whole value question of
these converted guitars seems to be somewhat of a moot point. As with anything,
a guitar is worth what someone is willing to pay, and there are plenty of
people with more money than brains. There are always dealers willing to exploit
that. I guess they have to make a living.
Converting many of these
instruments, like a Martin archtop or classical guitar, might destroy its
"historical value" (Whatever that means; who cares?), but
they were mediocre to begin with, and making them into flattops can produce a
wonderful instrument. Just ask David Bromberg. He started all this, with Marc Silber's help. — Dan Alexander, Dan Alexander Audio, El Cerrito CA
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X-bracing vintage guitars is a touchy subject with us as well. We strongly value
preserving guitars to their original sound characteristics and purpose. The RK Carson Robison Jumbo you reference that David Hatchard
and I did the brace-ectomy on was a one-off, just to hear what all the fuss was
about. No intention of doing it again. — Benn Carlson, Vintage Licks Guitars,
Fort Myers FL
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While I fundamentally agree with you, taking severely damaged
instruments and altering them is not a problematic call. — Laurence Wexer, Wexer Guitars, New York
NY
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I've seen and heard many of
David Sheppard's conversions. I really like the results. David does fine work.
Sometimes I look at instruments he converts and wonder how he can make a
profit converting a Kay or Harmony on spec. I'd never even consider taking
an instrument with low potential retail value and converting it. I have no
problem converting a better-quality Kay, Regal or Harmony square neck into an
instrument that has potential to sell at a profit in the current market,
but to do one on spec my shop would have to lack work
for me to do, or it would need to have been at a customer's request.
I've done several conversions. The most recent
was a 1932 Martin 0-28K that came to me in parts. It had a replaced headstock, the
neck was off, and the bridge was split. It came out of the factory with
standard-height bar frets, so it seemed a perfect candidate to
convert. It would've been much harder to sell as a Hawaiian instrument. It
sold soon after completion.
There are good- and bad-sounding guitars with
all kinds of bracing patterns. If they can potentially be made better sounding
with some modification, I have no problem with that. I've played hundreds of KG-11s and KG -14s. They varied in sound from great to awful. Sound is so
subjective; a guitar that sounds bad to me can be fine to somebody else's
ear.
At what I have to pay for and sell these guitars for, I'd
probably never consider conversion. They are barely worth the cost of a neck
reset, and luckily I've found a way to use my heat press iron to get the neck
angles right on them. The good thing about re-bracing them is you can
change the neck angle and braces in one operation. Since most of them need neck
re-sets, this may be a viable option for a bad sounding one with a bad neck
angle. — Scott
Freilich, Top Shelf Music, Buffalo NY
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Back in the late 1960s to
early 1970s era, the new Martin and Gibson offerings were so-so at best, so
conversions offered a path to better instruments. Nowadays, with so many
individual and small-company builders like Collings, Santa Cruz, Merril, the
list goes on, there are so many great guitars to choose from without chopping
up the old stuff.
I recently did a neck
reshape on a Gibson LG-1 that had been converted by Dave Shepard. Dave’s work
was great and the customer loved the less chubby neck profile we did, but in
the end he had about as much [invested] in the guitar as he would have had in a
new or good used original guitar. The LG-1 that was used never sounded good,
nor would it ever sound good, but it was decent wood. In the case of this
guitar, it all worked out.
The question for me is which
guitars are candidates for conversion and which should be left alone. No matter
which guitars get converted or altered I am always disappointed by bad
craftsmanship. I think the fretted instrument world is way behind the violin
world where changes and modifications have been going on for a couple hundred
years. It is not likely that one could find an Italian master violin that has
not had the neck lengthened, the bass bar changed, and wood added or removed. — Jim
Baggett, Mass Street Music, Lawrence KS
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I understand the principle
of not altering vintage instruments to preserve their originality, but
historically, it's nothing new. Certainly there were some unfortunate
losses due to alterations of old instruments, but it contributed to the design of [new]
instruments in some instances. I don’t think every
archtop Martin should be converted, but because of a few conversions, we now
have M or 0000 models, which I like better than other designs.
This is the
history of these models as I know it:
Sometime in the 1960s, George
Gruhn converted a Martin F-7 or F-9 guitar to a flattop. Perhaps a little
earlier, John Lundberg did a similar conversion. Marc Silber, who worked
with Lundberg, did one as well. There were also conversions of Martin C models, but they were basically 000-sized guitars with arched tops that ended
up as 000-sized flattops for all intents and purposes.
The F models, Martin’s most expensive guitars at the time, were shaped like 000s, but were one size bigger with a carved arched top. So the conversions created a new
model of flattop guitar. To my knowledge, the conversion of the three F
models mentioned above all used the beautiful original necks of the
guitars. The necks were short scale and guitars produced in this
manner were not anything I would use. The short scale made the
strings too loose for my taste and did not produce a tone that does anything
for me personally.
There is a legacy of sorts with two of these guitar conversions
and a third conversion by Matt Umanov. Marc Silber worked in Lundberg’s
shop and Matt Umanov worked in Marc Silber’s shop. Matt stayed at my
apartment for a period of time in the 1960s when he was at loose ends. Some time later, when he had his own place in Greenwich Village, he called and told me that
he had a guitar I should buy. If I bought it, he’d give me a
present. I went down to his shop and saw the guitar; it was an
F-7. I can’t remember if the top was off or not. It cost $400.00
and I had the money, so I bought the guitar and left it with Umanov.
A year
or so later Umanov called me and told me he’d finished my guitar. I don’t believe
he’d told me what he was going to do with it; certainly not all he was going to
do with it. He’d put a new top and new neck on the body and inlaid it with style-42 inlays. At
the time I had a 00-42 and 000-42, and this looked like a 000-42 but a bit bigger. Indeed, the lower bout
of this guitar was broader than a dreadnought, but the sides were not nearly as
deep. To me, the
crucial thing Umanov did was to put a long-scale neck on it. He’d bought
a dreadnought neck from Martin and put it on the guitar.
As a result, Umanov's guitar had a wonderful, focused bass sound and a
rich treble. When played through a microphone, either in a concert or
recording studio, you got a rich sound without the woofy bass sound of the
notes rolling around a big dreadnought body. It sounded like a dreadnought
after the woof has been eq-ed out. The thing about the F-7s and F-9s
before conversions is that in spite of the arched top, they still sounded like
flattop instruments, although not nearly as good as when a flattop was put on
them.
Martin approached me at one
point to show me a guitar they were planning to make that was
similar to mine, but with the side depth of a dreadnought. I tried it for a week
or so, and told them it was a nice guitar, but not one I would play. They
then sheepishly told me they had been asked for a guitar like the one I
played so many times that they felt they should make one. (They also said
they hadn’t wanted to tell me that).
When I asked why they hadn’t made one
like the one I played, they said because it had no bass. That surprised
me and I got out my guitar and played it for them so they could [hear] it had a
beautiful bass sound. They were astounded. All the executives had
told them that it couldn’t possibly have any bass because it wasn’t deep
enough. I then took my 0000 guitars (by then I had two or more), and met
with the Martin executives and showed them that they had a great bass
sound. I left one of them with them and they copied it. It became
their M model, although sometimes they call it a 0000 (quadruple-0).
For some
reason George Gruhn doesn’t want to give Matt Umanov credit for creating the
0000 or M guitar. He tells me I popularized it, but refuses to admit the Martin factory actually copied one of my guitars. Anyhow, that’s most
of the story. There are still [unconverted] Martin F archtops here and there,
although they’re rare. They were expensive and not popular, but the M
or 0000 in different grades of trim is buyable and popular. For a year
or so Martin was making only dreadnought and M models. — David Bromberg, David Bromberg Fine Violins,
Wilmington DE
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© 2015 Kenneth Lelen — All Rights Reserved
