June 19, 2018

Sarzana 2018

This guitar has had two lives. The first began when I made it for a guitar show in Sarzana, Italy, in 2015, from where it got its name. It hadn’t a magnetic pickup  then, only the condenser mic AKG C411PP. After that, it stayed at home. Many tried it, but not having a magnetic pickup was an obvious limitation for selling it.

Recently I decided to install one. It was not a big problem, because  the guitar was prepared for it (for example, it had X instead of parallel bracing). I chose the prototype of a very special pickup that I made recently, the “Type 191”. Wound with very thick wire (VERY thick), it tries to emulate in a humbucker some of the characteristics of the CC pickups of almost a century ago. As the guitar didn’t have volume and tone controls, I decided to replace the tailpiece with another unit with the controls integrated.  Last but not least, I installed a bridge of a new design, based on D’Aquisto’s “wedge”. If you know it but you cannot find its peculiar “stick” in the photo, read the links on it: there are explanations for the interesting things in this guitar.

Of course, after three years the finish was a little dull, so I sanded and buffed the guitar again. It looks as beautiful as then, even more because the wood has gotten a darker deeper tone!

Note: As of 2019, this guitar went through another modification. I carved the top and back to make them more responsive, changed the bridge to a very light unit, improved the truss rod nut access cover and stripped the finish, that now is oil. Third life!

As all the guitars here, this one is just an example. If you want something similar but it is not exactly what you see, please take into account that you can change a lot of things, many without additional cost. Email me and we’ll talk!