My Acoustic Guitars Through The Ages

Acoustic Guitars.

It's been twenty seven or so years that I've been playing music (not including the piano lessons much earlier).  I'm on my third real acoustic guitar.  I initially started and learned on a busted up Stella with only the highest three strings on it.  The strings were rusted and old.  I bought it for three or five dollars at a garage sale in Andover, MA.  I played it nonstop until I had learned most chords on those three strings. My fingers peeled like bananas.  Finally I got my first actually guitar, a Seagull which I purchased at Daddy's Junky Music in Salem, NH for $100.00.  I had to relearn how to play all my songs on six strings.

After I accidentally fell on the Seagull (it was hidden beneath the blankets on my bed) and was unable to repair it, I purchased a Yamaha from a friend for $100.00.  Years earlier I helped her pick it out at Daddy's Junky Music Store in Salem, MA for $100.00.  She never learned to play it.

That guitar eventually became the town bike during the Baystate Open Mic years and it was used and abused until it was hopelessly mangled.  It still exists in my studio, strung in a Nashville tuning with old decaying strings.

My next one was my current favorite, the red Guild.  I got it at Retro Music in Keene, NH for $600.00.  I liked it immediately when I tried it out in the backroom.  The fact that is had a built in pick-up only sweetened the deal.  This is the guitar that I play daily and at shows and on recordings.

I have a back-up to the Guild. It is my Martin that I won in a singer/songwriter contest held by WRSI the River some years back.  It's quite nice.  I need to get it set-up.

There's one other acoustic guitar that's been with me since about 1993.  It's a cheapo nylon string classical Hondo that I bought at at garage sale for $20.00.  I've recorded with it and brought it with me on a zillion trips.  I've restrung it twice I think.  It's terrible, but I adore it.

Next episode: Electric Guitars.