Posted on January 16, 2026January 17, 2026 by Dale Phillips Harvey Thomas and the Infernal Music Machine Harvey Thomas and the Infernal Music Machine by Tim Olsen Originally published in American Lutherie #11, 1987 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie, Volume 1, 2000 Remember what the term “Japanese guitar” used to mean, back when beatniks roamed the earth and Elvis was still kinda nasty? The Beatles hadn’t landed and I was in the third grade when my big brother Jim brought home a brand new Japanese guitar. Loosely modeled after a classic, it was already caving in from the load of its steel strings. You don’t see them like this anymore, man. Painted-on binding, decal rosette, door skin luan plywood, basswood (or worse) neck, nice sharp ends on those rough brass frets. I was totally fascinated! But the word fascination found new meaning a year later when my even bigger brother Dick came home from college with what might as well have been the Messiah Strad. It was a very plain, small bodied New York era Epiphone archtop with a badly repaired crack running the full length of the soundboard, and he had bought it cheap in a pawn shop. The hand of mortal man never created such perfection. This was a gift from the angels! Oh, the lovely dissonances that it spoke as I whanged it with a juice glass slide! When Dick was begged, he would strum “Who Put the Overalls in Mrs. Murphy’s Chowder.” Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on October 10, 2025October 10, 2025 by Dale Phillips Rethinking the Semihollow Electric Guitar Rethinking the Semihollow Electric Guitar by Stephen Marchione from his 2011 GAL Convention workshop Originally published in American Lutherie #119, 2014 I have worked with jazz guitarist Mark Whitfield since 1998. I made him a 16" archtop guitar in 2000 and he has recorded six albums of his own with that guitar. In 2001, he started touring with Chris Botti, the Grammy-winning trumpet player who came from Sting’s band. Mark is a very busy player. In 2006, I went to see him playing with Chris Botti and a symphony orchestra at Jones Hall in Houston. Mark said, “Oh, I gotta show you a couple things on the guitar.” He was wearing through the binding with his right arm. A lot of the binding was worn away, and the sweat was going under the lacquer, although most of the lacquer was still intact. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 7, 2024May 19, 2025 by Dale Phillips Letter: Gittler Guitar Letter: Gittler Guitar by Anthony D. Blokzyl Originally published in American Lutherie #19, 1989 I read your request for information on the Gittler guitar with great relief! I have yet to see one of these unique instruments, and hope that they are still being manufactured somewhere. They were first mentioned, that I know of, in the August 1978 issue of Guitar Player. The Gittler is almost entirely of brushed stainless steel. There is a central “spine” through which are milled, at decreasing intervals, a series of holes that erupt fractionally. Through the holes are friction fitted short rods acting as frets. The inventor remarked in the article that the dowels could be turned to compensate quickly for wear, if such was feared. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 3 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on June 30, 2024May 14, 2025 by Dale Phillips Electric Guitar Setup Electric Guitar Setup by Erick Coleman and Elliot John-Conry from their 2006 GAL Convention workshop Originally published in American Lutherie #98, 2009 Guitar companies can only set up their guitars to a certain level and still be cost effective. So even a lot of brand new guitars are brought to our shop to be super set up. Since Erick works for Stewart-MacDonald and we both work in Dan Erlewine’s shop, most of the tools and materials we’re going to mention today are available from Stew-Mac. We do all the neck work on the neck jig. This jig simulates the guitar under string tension. If you simply remove the strings, set the guitar on your bench, tweak the truss rod until everything looks level, then proceed to level the frets, you may find that once it is strung again your leveling job has gone to hell. You haven’t accounted for the abnormalities that string tension usually puts in the neck, and neither have you accounted for the effects of gravity differences between the guitar lying flat on your bench and the guitar in playing position. So we not only use the jig to simulate string tension, we tilt the guitar into playing position before the jig is adjusted. We use about a 70° angle to simulate playing position, since few of the guitar players we know have a stomach flat enough to hold the guitar at a 90° angle to the planet. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of the Articles Online featured on our website for Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 3 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. MEMBERS: login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on June 28, 2024May 14, 2025 by Dale Phillips On-Board Preamps On-Board Preamps by Bob Meltz Originally published in Guild of American Luthiers Data Sheet #158, 1980 Seeing that I, like other luthiers, enjoy the finer things in life (i.e. food, clothing, shelter), it is always a pleasure to find something that a) provides the luthier with a good return on his investment in time and materials, and b) provides the customer with something useful at a reasonable price. Such is the case with this little tidbit. It happens that most of my clientele play electric instruments and I have implanted preamps in dozens of these instruments with universally good results. It seems that most electric guitarists playing rock, fusion, or contemporary jazz are endlessly searching for ways to provide them with the sound of small, overdriven tube-type amps. The most common device used to accomplish this is the “distortion box” as made by a number of companies. The disadvantages of this type of device are numerous: a clumsy box sitting on the floor with cords dangling at the feet of the player, added noise from all but the most expensive units, line loss when the effect is bypassed, etc. For all but the people who are looking to totally “raunch out”, the on-board preamp is a viable, indeed preferable, alternative. Although it provides practically no distortion of its own, the added output is enough to overdrive the preamp stage of almost any guitar amp. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
