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All Things Guitar Database
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MANZER
This is my main guitar. It's the one that gets all the abuse... baked in the summer, frozen in winter. I write with it, jam with it, and generally earn my living with it. Apart from my car, there is no other tool that I use as frequently as this little tree sculpture. Built by Toronto Luthier Linda Manzer in 1990, it's a deep bodied 6 string, with a gentle cutaway and a German spruce top inlaid with abalone and boxwood at the sound hole. If you think it bears more than a passing resemblance to a Larrivee, you're correct. Linda studied with Jean Larrivee when she was learning the ropes... (that was many years ago, now she invents new ropes) this guitar replaced my old Guild D35 which had given up the ghost a few months before. I was desperate to find a replacement for that Guild, something more refined, better built, and capable of a wider variety of sounds. Manzer agin

This guitar does/is all that. I'm especially lucky to own it as I know that this was only the second of the new Cowpoke model that Linda had just started making and I rather think she was keeping it for herself, but I came bumbling into her shop desperate for a guitar and once I laid my eyes and my hands on this, it was all over. I think I sat there for a good 2-3 hours with Linda peering in on me every now and then to make sure I was alright. In the end, I think she agreed to sell it to me so I would go away!! I'd never owned or even played a guitar like this before and even after 12 nonstop years, it still has the ability to surprise me with it's depth and beauty. Best of all, it's a road warrior and has already survived a few nasty run-ins with our country's national airline. I love this guitar. (Thanks Linda) www.manzer.com

GUILD D35 - (1981)
I've had this old dreadnought for over 20 years. I bought it in Minneapolis from a guitar store in Dinkytown (The Music Emporium?). It was my first serious guitar and though I don't remember exactly how much I spent on it, I do remember thinking that it was some serious coin, for a dishwasher who was just starting to make a dollar playing music in the local coffeehouses. As my first professional. guitar, this guitar is very special to me, it was a solid, dependable workhorse and companion for ten tough years of baggage handlers, hot, summer workshop stages and freezing prairie tours. When I bought my Manzer Cowpoke in 1991, I was inspired by this guitar, looking for a replacement instrument that had the same sense of sonic and physical weight to it (but was built with more finesse and attention to detail). For live work, I prefer a guitar that has some heft or meatiness, an instrument that requires a little elbow grease to get it singing,. This Guild definitely has those qualities and can speak softly or roar (!) depending on the attack. Eventually though, it just couldn't take the abuse any more. I retired it in 1990 when the neck literally fell apart! After that, it sat in a case for three years (a sad reality for any guitar) until Linda Manzer was kind enough to build me a replacement neck. Alas, despite Linda's best efforts, it has never been the same and now it's a bit like the old horse that was put out to pasture (I'm too fond of her to ship her off to the glue factory!) It's a lovely old thing that deserves to be played more often than it is.

MORGAN 'RESOPHONIC'
This is a one-of-a-kind, wooden bodied, resonator style acoustic with a cutaway. Built by David Iannoni in Vancouver B.C., I believe this is his first (and only?) resonator style guitar. It has a very unique and warm Dobro-ish sound, but is not typical of most wooden resonator style guitars (chiefly because of it's solid top which alters the way the resonator responds). Like all of David Iannoni's instruments, this is well built and plays beautifully. It has a very percussive, woody attack and almost no decay... a sort of banjo-like sound that is very pleasing to the ear and perfect for fast finger picking. Originally commissioned by a collector on the west coast, it found it's way into my greasy mitts through the generosity of Rob Friedman (owner of Not Just Another Music Shop in Vancouver) - thanks Rob!

HARMONY (REBEL)(Ca. 1965)
This electric guitar was a mystery to me for years as I could not figure out what model it was. I bought it at Eddy Music in Nelson BC where it was hanging in the Not For Sale rack. I managed to talk my way out of the store with it after another customer declared it to be the ugliest guitar he'd ever seen. (Ha!) To me, it is the epitome of late sixties cool and was most definitely inspired by The Beatles and their ulta-hip Rickenbackers. Predictably it is a little murky sounding but it plays quite easily and frankly I wouldn't really have cared if it played like a baseball bat strung with dog intestines... It's cool as fuck and in gorgeous shape (it still had the little tag with the guy in a cowboy outfit playing a guitar). It's stand candy... it's for the video when I go through my rip-off-the-Beatles phase... I've strung it with medium strings (too heavy for most elec. players, but perfect for my ham fisted technique).

HAMMERTONE -1998
(Copy of the Vox Mandotar)
A truly wonderful hybrid of a mandolin and a 12 string Telecaster! This electric guitar has a version of the classic rounded Vox body shape, two Tele.-style pickups and twelve strings. What makes it really stand out is that it is strung a full octave above the standard guitar tuning, putting it in the mandolin range. It shimmers and chimes, is lovely for volume swells, cuts through the murk of even the loudest Blackie & the Rodeo Kings gig and is built for fighting off hordes of angry folkies. As it says on the little instruction sheet "This is not a toy". The Hammertone is built in Hamilton Ontario.

HARMONY MONTEREY (Ca. 1960-64)
I was given this acoustic arch top by my pal Brian denHertog when I'd finished producing his first record - Gypsy Wild and The Open Road (thanks Brian). Built in the early sixties, it was probably one of Harmony's top of the line arch tops and is still in great shape for its age. A red sunburst on a machine carved top, a lovely headstock logo and ingenious adjustable saddle make this a very striking guitar. The neck feels good and not as baseball bat-like as you'd think. Joe Yanuzziello (a fine builder of retro-electric guitars in Toronto) mounted an old deArmond style pickup right up by the neck. It sounds pretty good, especially with flat wound strings.

HARMONY SILHOUETTE (1964)
I bought this guitar at Songbird Music in Toronto sometime in 1999. Once again the 'quirky' Harmony thing caught my eye. I played it at the shop for a while and realised I was holding a unique, soulful guitar... a cheap, unique, soulful guitar. These things were only about $120 new and now are rarely more than double that price (even in Canadian $$). Featuring the deArmond Golden Tone pickups, a ridiculously simple, but nonetheless effective tremolo system, and a rather fat neck that plays nicely, this electric is a great little guitar. Inspired by the Fender Jazzmaster, this is one of the low-end Silhouettes Having said that, and despite its lowly status, its capable of producing a wide variety of tones and stays in tune remarkably well. Another Harmony triumph and another bargain for those who like to pay less than $500 for a soulful, vintage guitar.

OK, I'll admit it, I love Harmony guitars. I love their esthetic, their prices and above all, their tone. If you are interested in learning more about these wonderful instruments, and the company that built them, check out: www.broadwaymusicco.com

It's a decent site with some very cool pictures of guitars and old catalogues.

If you have a Harmony fetish, are interested in vintage cheapies, or know of a cool web site that you think might be of interest, drop me a line - I'm just learning about this stuff and am intrigued.

GIBSON SG (1971)
This guitar was given to me by Andrew Paule, an old friend from my Minneapolis days, he simply said 'here, you should have this'... It's not a real fancy SG (I've seen a late 60's version of this classic Gibson design which was far more ornate and intricate) however it does boast a really good pair of humbuckers that have that lovely chiming quality and vast tonal possibilities. This is my first non-Harmony, 'classic' electric guitar and is a beautiful addition to my little gang of cheapies. Ultimately there are two things I have to do with this guitar. Remove the tremolo which is a major contributor to my tuning headaches AND learn a few AC/DC covers. This guitar with its skinny neck and double cutaway horns a is lean, mean metal machine (ha!).

HARMONY HOLIDAY (Ca. 196?)
Looking very much like a cheap, bottom of the line version of the Harmony Stratotone, this Holiday is a one trick pony, with a single pickup, volume and tone control. The switch that you see beside the volume pot actually turns the tone pot off and on(!)

I found this at a little out-of-the-way music store in New Hampshire, stuck on a rack amongst new Fenders, Paul Reed Smiths and reissue Danelectros...it spoke to me, actually it said 'get me out of here... NOW!' So I did.

ROCA - LA BRADONA VALENCIA
Spanish 'Flamenco' style (?)
It's funny how little I know about this guitar's origins or history, and yet, it has a large sentimental value for me. It is my first guitar. It was hanging on the wall of my stepfather's front room, when he and my Mother got together. I guess it was inevitable that I would take it down and start trying to figure out chords and sounds on it. This guitar was my introduction to all things guitar and to a passion that has intrigued and captivated me ever since. I learned to play everything from Bach to The Beatles. Homeward Bound to Romanza and Air on a G string and still enjoy it's sound, that peculiar (to steel string players) sonority and timbre that you can only get from gut strings. It's not very well made and is in need of some repairs...one of these days... maybe I'll get to record something with it.