Chris' Multi-Scale Baritone Ready for Delivery

I'll be sending out Chris' redwood/ziricote multi-scale baritone on Monday! This wood combination produced a very rich sound, with a deep focused growl in the bass and lots of sparkly sustaining overtones in the treble.

I've got new studio shots of a few instruments, Chris' Redwood/Ziricote Baritone, a European Spruce/Sapele Grand Concert, and a Bearclaw Sitka Spruce/African Mahogany Grand Concert. Love that beautiful wood! :)

Chris' Multi-Scale Baritone is Back From Lacquer

Chris' multi-scale baritone is back from lacquer and, thanks in no small part to the fine work of lacquer specialist Addam Stark, it's a looker! Credit also goes to LMI, who sent along the beautiful redwood top and dramatic ziricote back and sides. I'm looking forward to having a strum on this baby. It follows the same design as a custom instrument I built for Mike Oliver, and I'm going to bring another one like it to the Healdsburg Guitar Festival in August, besides the one I'll be building for the great maestro Don Alder. This is gettin' to be a popular guitar! :)

A Sitka Spruce/Indian Rosewood Deep Baritone

It's been a little while since I built an Indian rosewood guitar, and I really have enjoyed working on this Sitka spruce/Indian rosewood Deep Baritone Cutaway. Since it's so common, Indian rosewood is often thought of as a basic baseline to which other woods can be compared, a sort of neutral reference point. But I don't hear it that way at all! Indian rosewood is definitely one of my very favorites. I think it tends to offer a particular fullness in the bass and a sort of "transparent" depth in the midrange that is unique and very desireable. If Indian rosewood were not in such good supply, its unique and wonderful characteristics would easily justify whatever price people will pay for woods that are less easy to find.

3 Cheers and 7 Strings for Rune Mandelid

Rune Mandelid recently contacted me about building a couple of unique guitars for him. Rune's an extremely creative and accomplished jazz-and-more guitarist. I've gotten to know a little about his playing from clips that I've seen online. He recently sent me this....I thought it was technically astonishing and musically very beautiful. The link requires the latest version of Flash player, but even if you don't have it you may find it worth the trouble...
"Circle"
It's such an exciting challenge to build an instrument for someone as dedicated and briliiant as Rune. It's also exciting to look forward to hearing an seeing a few of my creations put to such use. I'm building two 7-string instruments for Rune. One's a steel-string, which is ready for lacquer now.
http://mustapickguitars.com/40mandelid/6/index.htm
Soon I'll be building him a nylon 7-string to match. What fun!