Members Roy Brooks Posted December 22, 2006 Members Posted December 22, 2006 It is a 1934 Style O. I went to Elderly Instruments and tried out a few newer Nationals and a Beltona. The Beltona sounded especially nice. The Style O that I ended up buying wasn't displayed. So I went up to the counter and got them to get it out for me. I checked it over to make sure it was structurally sound, tuned it to standard (all the resonator guitars were tuned to open G or open E), and played it awhile. The newer ones sounded good. And I think I would have been pleased with a new one, especially considering that the new Nationals were a good bit less expensive than the 1934. But the 1934 Style O had a ghost in it. It really sounded like back in the day, dogg. So I decided to go ahead and get it since I could afford it. I also bought about $400 in CDs of music from back in the day, dogg- Carter Family, Riley Pucket, some Polish fiddle music, a rockabilly box set, a Blind Blake box set- as well as a few Hawaiian steel method books and Blind Blake, Reverend Gary Davis, Blind Boy Fuller, and country blues transcription books by Stefan Grossman. Unfortunately it is way too much too bring home on the plane. So it is getting shipped to my house in South Carolina. I also got an Electro Harmonix Nano LPB-1 Linear Power Booster. The photo below is of the exact guitar I bought: The guitar has new tuners and a new bridge. And it plays nicely. I am very pleased with it. All things considered I can actually say that I am really done buying for awhile. I saw all kinds of cool instruments at Elderly including some nice old Guild and Gibson archtops. But I already have guitars like that at home. My ES-175 is older than the one Elderly had. I plan on devoting a good bit of my time from now on revising my method book, recording, and practicing since I have a nice set of tools to do it with.
Members Loud Librarian Posted December 22, 2006 Members Posted December 22, 2006 Wow, nice score, that's got mojo for sure. Are you going to play any open tuning slide on it, or just stick with the standard tuning picking? What model Beltona did you try out, was it a single cone like this Style O?
Members Freeman Keller Posted December 23, 2006 Members Posted December 23, 2006 I'm glad that worked for you. I know we were kind of negative about an old one, but it looks like you got a good one. Now slide on in....
Members Roy Brooks Posted December 23, 2006 Author Members Posted December 23, 2006 Originally posted by Loud Librarian Wow, nice score, that's got mojo for sure. Are you going to play any open tuning slide on it, or just stick with the standard tuning picking? What model Beltona did you try out, was it a single cone like this Style O? I may play some slide on it. And I will play some Blind Blake and Blind Boy Fuller style fingerpicking on it. Though I'll let the guitar tell me what music it wants to make. I'm glad I went ahead and bought the old one. And I was actually kind of pleased that it had new tuners and a new biscuit bridge. It plays really well, as well as the newer ones, and it sounds really good like I was hoping it would sound. The Beltona I tried was very similar to a Style O. It was a brass bodied single resonator.
Members AK47 Posted December 23, 2006 Members Posted December 23, 2006 That guitar has GAS written all over it. Sometimes when I'm playing on old guitar like this my mind wanders to whose hands may have been on it before mine and how many times has this old song been played on this? Part of the Mojo of when the guitar seems to know the song. Congrats!
Members bjorn-fjord Posted December 23, 2006 Members Posted December 23, 2006 Despite my misgivings and dire warnings in your previous post, I must admit that there is just something about the vintage ones. Enjoy.
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