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60's Carved Vintage George Barnes Guild Acousti Lectric Model Jazz Archtop | eBay
um... still not sure how i feel about it just yet, but it certainly is an interesting curiosity from the past.
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06-20-2016 09:27 AM
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super cool & rare guitar..horrible (gibby) mods!!!..
as gb liked his-
cheers
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You don't say! Who needs that monstrosity?! As fan of Guild I dont need no Gibson mods, i love Guild sound for what it is and consider it superior to Gibson. So those mods are like downgrade. I imagine Gibson fans wont be too keen on getting it either, with so many real deals around. And for this price... Im just laughing at the seller!
Originally Posted by neatomic
super cool & rare guitar..horrible (gibby) mods!!!..
as gb liked his-
cheers
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I've always wanted one of these even since I first heard about them, and George Barnes is one of my favourite guitarists. I imagine it would be less prone to feedback than other larger carved top instruments. These were one of the most (possibly the most) expensive guitars that Guild made at the time.
Not sure what the previous owner of that guitar was thinking by whacking Gibson parts on that guitar. I agree with Hep to the Jive, on a Guild guitar like this I feel that Gibson parts are indeed a downgrade.
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Forget the Gibson parts, what a pos for that price!
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That term you so eloquently used was also my first thought. Originally Posted by boatheelmusic
Also a popular similar term in Australia is to replace the first word with "bucket" thus BOS.
Another term that sprung to mind was "delusional"
But mostly I enjoyed the picture of the guitar case with a guitar lead coiled up and jammed into where the headstock will
gently rest. So well thought out ......such attention to detail.
The "devil may care" attitude is just pure class.
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i hadn't realized this guitar would be so polemic. cost of production aside, i wonder why this no f hole method of construction didn't take off. were guitars already slaves to tradition by that point? while i find the look a little disconcerting in a magritte sort of way, couldn't they have made the holes a little smaller to hide them? or floating pickup rings? :lol from some angles, like in the photo above, they don't look so bad.
and like you guys, i think guilds are pretty cool and prefer the guild aesthetic to the subbed in gibson parts. the evidence suggests the ladies dig them more, too.
i do wonder about the pickups in the auction, though. what are they?
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IIRC, George Barnes said in an interview in Guitar Player that the no-soundhole idea was his, as he believed that soundholes were the main source of feedback, and so requested this design. Guild complied, and sold guitars bearing Mr. Barnes' name, if not all his ideas. Thank goodness for recordings!
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There _were_ sound holes around both pickups. Barnes' design.
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I don't get the dismissive attitude. This is an exceedingly rare guitar- one of 11- designed to the specs of a man who basically *was* the living history of electric guitar up until his death. He preceeded Charlie Christian and was a facile and commanding musician. For some reason I could only read part of the story on the auction, almost half the page was off the screen and couldn't be scrolled- did I understand rightly that Guild didn't actually finish the guitar? I suppose the original owner didn't *replace* the Guild parts with Gibson parts but instead completed it with parts he could find and seemed apropos. He coulda used parts off a Kay, at least he picked an L4.
If you haven't heard Barnes's live album on David Grisman's Acoustic Disk label, do yourself a favor. You eill not find a more fluid jazz guitarist (although I don't really care for his tone all that much, but the playing is superb).
All that said, though, $19,000 seems absurd. Even half of that would seem unlikely.
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Here's another in F https://shop.gryphonstrings.com/prod...tar-in-f-48116 .
Short scale for those stubby fingers.
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They are asking 19k ? But isnt this the exact same guitar that is for sale at Guitars n jazz for 11 k ??!!??
https://www.gbase.com/gear/guild-george-barnes-sunburst
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It happens. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_red_paperclip .
The end result could be a $100m super yacht to rival Suh Philip George's.
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Panther Guitars, the seller of this George Barnes Guild Acoustic-Lectric , received the guitar as a consignment piece from a friend and collector. Theretofore we were not all that familiar with Barnes. And also not with his guitar design and production thereof. Upon listening to his recordings it's hard to understand why he did not get the recognition and fame similar to Johnny Smith. His superb playing is a joy to listen to. This guitar that he designed with Smith is a rarity- one of 11- and unfinished by Guild who dropped the project suddenly. Number 11 of 11 pieces was shipped out of the factory to Mr. Dale Wagstaff of Draper, Utah. He was not from Colorado Springs as our listing mistakenly said. He fitted the body (which had not been completed and sold unfinished to Dale) with Gibson parts that he could use- an L4 tailpiece, pickups, and wiring in order to play this very unusual guitar.
Wagstaff Music is apparently legendary in that part of the country known for its annual sales, its clinics, and its help to many amateur musicians. From what I can gather Dale Wagstaff , founder and owner, died in 2014 at the age of 72. He apparently was friendly with Johnny Smith who was from Colorado Springs in the neighboring state. There is a You-Tube video of the interior of the store taken some 20 years ago or so with a very young looking Dale Wagstaff playing at the end of the clip. He was not playing the Barnes in the video but a flattop.
Why he didn't or couldn't get the parts to complete the guitar as designed is unknown. The piece we have is his handiwork in order to complete the Geo Barnes so he could play it. As to it's value, well- who knows? Some of the remarks on this site infer that this guitar is likened to a bucket of excrement. Very nice gentlemen. To Mr. Cunamara's nice note I wanted to reply to explain how we got it, and what it is. There may have been other unfinished pieces that Guild simply discarded. This one, number 11 survived.
Phazyme of Panther Guitars, Princeton, New Jersey
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Dale Wagstaff's obituary. Original owner of the 11th Guild Barnes
Dale Wagstaff Obituary - Riverton, UT | The Salt Lake Tribune
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I was in SLC with time to kill in 1981. I wish I had known about Wagstaff's Music then. Originally Posted by phazyme
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phazyme, appreciate that you made the effort to check in with us...very nice..i think we are very appreciative of the guitar and guilds in general, but felt perplexed by asking price (especially with the non guild parts)...and btw, i see it has been reduced somewhat..
luck with sale, i wish george barnes was more famous and his guitars worth 100K $$$ !!...but alas
cheersLast edited by neatomic; 06-26-2016 at 11:31 PM. Reason: clarity
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George Barnes should have been far more famous. We get excited by a lot of great players here, but I think George Barnes was a cut above many of them.
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Ultimately, guitars are worth only what one is willing to pay, so who knows. It is one of the rarest of rare Guilds, and the history is interesting. Best of luck with the sale!
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IIRC Barnes was a child prodigy type player, being a pro in his teenage years and maintaining a highly active career unril his untimely death. ISTR his daughter posting here a few times. Is that her with GB in the photo with his prototype?
His design must have worked to his satisfaction, he used that guitar for many years.
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I could be wrong, but my 30-some year old memory of the George Barnes Guild my friend Doug D. owned was that the two pickups were mounted on individual tall block posts, rather than the "longitudinal block" the ebay item described. Doug's was the natural color, looked like the one George has in that photo above, with a lot of space around each humbucker. It does make more sense that something other than two posts/blocks glued straight to the back plate was in there, but that was my impression from viewing it back then..
I knew it was an unusual guitar, but still very surprised to hear there were only 11 in total. To my best recollection, Doug had bought the guitar from Gale Benson in Detroit, and eventually sold it thru Elderly Instruments (Lansing, MI) on consignment, going to a collector in Japan. He ditched his Gibson Howard Roberts the same way.
I'm a big fan of George Barnes, and now wish I had wrestled that rare Guild out of my friend's hands a few more times before it disappeared.
John A
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that's his wife evelyn with him in pic... Originally Posted by Cunamara
cheers
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Thank you for your nice note. We make no profit out of this, as it is for a friend/teacher who plays in a big band, one of the few remaining in New Jersey. In return he gives me lessons! He bought this as a working guitar not for investment. He also spent $1000.00 to tune it up for his gigging. Anyhow, he doesn't like the size of it, being a little to large for his tastes. So here it is up for sale. I did not play it, oddly enough, just took some fast photos and sent it on it's way, not realizing what it was till later. We didn't want to have a $15,000 or so guitar hanging around the shop. So I can't remark on its sound till I get it back to ship it for him. Thanks again for the comment. I've only written several times to this site. Once when I received Joe Beck's Martin Alto Guitar from the Beck Estate. I took photos for the site of the guitar which was left as Joe left it. This site really serves a cool purpose for jazz guys to talk. The fact that I was not familiar with George Barnes- (how could that be!?) - and now am not only familiar with his playing, but have a story to tell- I owe partially to this discussion group.
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