The U.S. debut of the Yamaha CGX102 nylon string acoustic-electric guitar with advanced electronics and a modest price.
Inspired by the historic classical guitars, the CGX102 offers cutting edge technology with its new System68N preamp, which features Yamaha’s contact pickup along with on-board tone controls and a precision tuner, offering “natural tonal reproduction.”
Priced well under $500, the CGX102 comes with a solid spruce top, and a body made from nato. Also known as “eastern mahogany,” nato, or nyatoh as it is spelled in Southeast Asia, resembles cherry in looks, more than it does mahogany, but it is a suitable replacement for mahogany on lower-priced guitars, especially when matched to a solid top and played through electronic amplification.
An exquisite recreation of the very first Martin D-28
Recently purchased from movie star Richard Gere, for the Martin Museum
The Ur D-28 was copied in minute detail to create its doppelganger, the D-28 Authentic 1931
“The D-28 Authentic 1931 is big guitar that has a big voice, yet it is agile and graceful and truly a thing of beauty. It has a lot of air and open space inside that expansive tone bubble that effortlessly glows out around the guitarist as a strummed chord is left to swell and waver. The trebles are fat but pure, the bass is robust and warm as a bearskin coat, and the mid-range stays up front in a way 14-fret dreads never quite manage…
Lighter than one might guess a rosewood guitar can be, it produces an enormous amount of rich, yet open tone with little effort, but loves to be strummed hard as well. Having played the “Gere guitar” on different occasions, I can say the prototype of the D-28A 1931 actually has more horsepower under the hood. And it has perfect intonation up the neck, something pre-war Martins never quite achieve.”
Our second in a series of reviews on the new Martin Authentics features a very special guitar indeed. More reviews will follow after the Holiday Weekend. Happy 4th of July everybody! We are pleased to kick off our holiday festivities with this in depth look at the recreation of one of the most historic guitars made by one of America’s oldest family businesses.
This new OM-18 A 1933 is the first OM made with Martin’s Authentic Series specs and hide glue. And boy, is it a doozy!
I played the prototype at the factory in January, when it was about as new as new can be. With mahogany for the back and sides, the OM-18 Authentic 1933 sounded clear and full at the same time.
This weekend I played an example of the production run and it was even better. It is like taking a time machine back to 1933 and getting your hands on a brand new OM-18, made the year C.F. Martin and Co. were celebrating their 100th anniversary and were busy setting the gold standard that all acoustic guitars have been compared to ever since.
New vintage models like right out of a time machine, the Martin Authentic Series offers affordable replicas of their most legendary pre-war guitars.
While we have been slow to update the site after our successful review of the new Schoenberg Quartet, we have been busy as bees preparing for a whole slew of new reviews. July is shaping up as Martin Month, as One Man’s Guitar delves deep into the Authentic mystique, with reviews of all the new Authentics, in many respects more authentic than ever.
“Between 1930 and 1944, C.F. Martin & Co. set the gold standard for steel-string acoustic guitars. Today, Martin offers a new a growing number of models virtually identical to those priceless vintage instruments…
As economic realities changed after World War II, along with tastes in popular music, so did Martin’s designs and core product line. While their contemporary instruments remained popular with professional musicians and amateur enthusiasts alike, the lightly-built and ultra-responsive instruments from Martin’s “golden era” remained highly coveted, even after prices for a pre-war dreadnought, 000 or OM reached into the tens of thousands of dollars. As C.F. Martin IV was fond of saying, “Our number one competition for a new Martin is a used Martin.”
… in January 2013, Martin introduced a collection of guitars as part of the Authentic series. Made entirely in the Custom Shop, the new Authentics have proven to be among the most accurate reproductions of pre-war Martins available today, and certainly among the most affordable available anywhere.”
The Schoenberg Quartet Stephen Bruton model combines the expanded tonal range of a large guitar with the response and dynamics of a small guitar, thanks to its 12-fret 0000 design.
“A mightily successful combination of traditional and contemporary design and construction, the Schoenberg Quartet wide-top, 12-fret cutaway guitar is light of weight but large in voice. With impressive projection and effortless volume, it has the woody, full-bodied lows of a cello, trebles that sustain like of a well-played violin and some of the most richly complex chords this side of a baby grand piano.”
Guitarist Eric Schoenberg designed the guitar based on the concept originally suggested by his friend, the late Austin session man and touring sideman, Stephen Bruton. The guitar is named the Stephen Bruton model in his honor. It is available exclusively through Schoenberg’s shop in Tiburon, California, north of San Francisco.
California luthier Randall Kramer was engaged to built the entire line of Quartets. This particular example is made with Brazilian rosewood back and sides and an Adirondack spruce top. It also includes several custom-ordered features. It is the result of pre-war guitar traditions, cutting edge luthiery technology, and the scientific method of Chladni plate resonant frequency tuning, which inspired Benjamin Franklin to invent the harmonium, and was used by nineteenth-century violin makers.
The Schoenberg Standard and Schoenberg Soloist now have a big brother for those seeking a bigger, fuller voice with all the comfort of a classic fingerstyle lap-piano.
“This guitar is so finely tuned in terms of dynamics and response that it is basically effortless to play, in any tuning. There is a gorgeous complexity to the harmonics, but an unperturbed clarity to the fundamentals, and an organic sensibility to the sustain and decay of each, which makes it a delight to play.”
A Bone Saddle and a Gloss Top add a lot to the Martin D1GT.
Gary K. writes:
I recently bought a D-1GT and I really love it. Currently upgrading to bone from the factory plastic hardware. I have a question regarding Martin naming convention. I know that the “D” stands for dreadnought and “OM” orchestral model. What do the last part of the model name (the “GT”) stand for?
Spoon replies:
Hi Gary, thanks for your question and congratulations on the guitar.
“GT”
The GT stands for Gloss Top. The D-1 and some other models came with a satin finish on the top. The GT version includes the upgrade of a high-gloss finish on the top, which is resistant to dings and pick wear, and gives the guitar a look similar to more expensive models. Your D-1GT is among the best values Martin has ever offered.
Upgrading from plastic hardware
A bone saddle can provide greater definition, sustain and purer fundamental notes off the strings of an acoustic guitar, well worth the effort and expense.
When one upgrades to a new bone saddle they may find that things sound a bit shrill. But that only lasts a short while. After the guitar is played for several days that will burn off, leaving a clear, transparent ring.
The nut material at the top of the fingerboard matters as well, but not nearly as much as the saddle.
Other material used for saddles and nuts include tusks or jaw bones from various animals, as well as fossilized ivory – which is actually only partially mineralized.
Fossilized walrus ivory and fossilized mammoth ivory are most common. Of the two, I prefer the mammoth. Both add some warmth and roundness to the tone of a guitar, which can be a welcome addition to a guitar with a brand new Adirondack spruce top, since Adirondack is usually pretty tight and brittle sounding for the first year or two. But in exchange, the guitar will lose some high end sparkle. So it can be a tradeoff. FMI seems to take away less of that Adi chime than the Walrus variety.
Overall, I find plain old bone, usually from a cow shin, is virtually identical in tone to the elephant ivory commonly used on guitars in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century.
Many also change to bridge pins made of bone, or other natural materials. While bridge pins are not nearly as important as the saddle in terms of sound production and tone, they do make a difference. But Martins have shipped with pins made of one sort of plastic or another since the 1920s and many people are happy with their guitars, without the need to switch out the pins.
– TSP
Bone Saddle
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After reviewing his latest album, and latest guitar, we will be happily seeing Juber playing Juber on a Juber, tonight at the Cutting Room in New York’s Famous Manhattan.
8 PM.
A full schedule of his upcoming concerts is available at the end of the CD review.
A complete schedule has been posted of the Taylor Guitar Road Shows May-June, where you can play the latest guitars, meet Taylor reps and learn about their Expression pickup systems. There are many dates in Europe, as well as the U.S.
No ordinary guitar…this OMC-44K LJ has an Orchestra Model body size, with a Cutaway and it is made in a modern version of Martin’s Style 44, with back and sides of Hawaiian Koa wood, known for its unique combination of clear trebles, warm harmonics, but with a more open mid-range compared to other rich tonewoods like rosewood. Just the way Laurence Juber likes it.
A “late-night” record of fingerstyle artistry, Juber’s Under and Indigo Sky is …
Languid, lovely, evocative… a melt into a sumptuous sofa, and the sonic equivalent of isolated pools of low light playing off facets of cut crystal and opulent aperitif, close sensuous voices, soft laughter bittersweet with memory at the end of an evening. A warm, layered and very human scene painted entirely with one acoustic guitar drenched with resonant chords, clear and unhurried melody lines, and shadowy blue bass notes that rise or fall in pitch or pace like a melancholy pulse. An exquisite piece of music played on an exquisite guitar, exquisitely.
And that is just the first track on Juber’s Under an Indigo Sky, the latest CD from the two-time Grammy winner.
It was mixed by Al Schmitt, who has won 19 Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006.
On the CD, the slightest string vibration, creak of the guitar’s hide glue joints, or wave of Juber’s “virtual whammy bar” technique used to coax out every drop of resonance is heard clearly and in three dimensions. The vinyl version must be breathtaking.
As impressive as the vibrant playing is, it is the more languid performances, such as Cry Me A River with its sustained chords and un-struck string glides that truly show off the mastery of the engineer and the exceptional qualities of the guitar. While both the mellow and the vigorous selections reveal the mastery and exceptional qualities of the guitarist.
by 
