American-made guitars only accounted for approximately 10 percent of the , guitars sold at retail in the U. New products like the Laurence Juber series, named after a guitar virtuoso who has played with the likes of Paul McCartney, are getting a warm reception, according to customer service manager Julian Henslee.
We got a remarkable response last year, Henslee said. A photo of Henslee with Fidel Castro decorates his office, along with an amplifier, five guitars, a mandolin, gushingly signed celebrity photos, and a guidebook to Cuba.
The phone rings intermittently — dealers, representatives, and a crewmember from The Judds band alerting him to the upcoming television show. Henslee said to watch for continued innovations and new models, including the possible addition of an imported line of mandolins, and perhaps even steel-topped Dobro guitars.
Visit the Tacoma Guitars link at www. Subscribe Newsletter Contact Us. Link copied to clipboard! In just five years since it debuted, Tacoma Guitars has claimed the No. The company's first product was something the casual observer may not even recognize as a guitar: the Papoose, a compact instrument with an off-center sound hole and a higher voice than a standard guitar.
The next, called the Chief, was a full-size instrument easily recognized as a relative of the Papoose by the paisley-shaped sound hole set in its top front shoulder. Tacoma now produces everything from mandolins and basses to standard guitars that have drawn comparisons with such venerable names as Martin and Taylor, the market leaders.
But the Papoose and the Chief best illustrate what sets Tacomas apart: bold designs, quality materials, marketing savvy. They were definitely going after some new design concepts. Guitar Player magazine noted the Papoose's "deft playability and sweet, mandolin-like voice'' and highlighted another Tacoma for its "bold acoustic tones with plenty of girth and top-end shimmer. I picked this one up and I went, 'Oh!
They've done it right. They play great. They sound great. And they travel great. So what else do I need? The guitar's ancestors may date to pre-Enlightenment Europe, but American guitars are the ones most sought after by players and collectors. When we talk about an acoustic guitar today, we're typically talking about a descendent of a particularly American branch of the instrument family.
We're talking about the lineage engendered by the Martin family in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Martin defined an entire category of guitar, the steel-string flat-top, from which other makers have derived their own lines — Gibson, Guild, Taylor, Yamaha, Tacoma.
Steel-string guitars tend to look alike because the basic sound-hole shapes and sizes seem to work well with all types of woods and other design factors, Wheeler says.
But Tacoma's internal bracing patterns and the designs of the Papoose and Chief series offer distinct departures. It is unconventional.
The steel strings stretching from the bridge and up the slender neck to the head of a guitar place about pounds of pressure on the thin wood of the instrument's face. An acoustic guitar's sound is produced when the plucking of the strings causes the face to vibrate, and the sound waves created by those vibrations bounce around inside the guitar before escaping through the sound hole.
Traditionally, the sound hole is cut in the center of the body's face, where the pressure is maximized. Without bracing around the sound hole, the face would split and the neck would snap free. But if insufficient bracing makes an unstable guitar, extra bracing cuts down on the movement of its face and results in a less sonorous instrument. By moving the sound hole away from the center, Tacomas gained stability while reducing the braces inside, allowing the top to vibrate more freely. Choosing a paisley-shaped hole that followed the curve of the top front produced an eye-catching design that set the brand apart.
The knowledge gained by developing the Papoose and the Chief helped lighten the bracings on the standard guitars that Tacoma also produces. And the instruments have been winning converts for their playing action and their bright, clear sound.
The lighting is dim, with only a hint of wood dust in the air. The clicking, banging and snapping that arise from the workstations creates something more than a buzz but less than an industrial din as he passes stacked sheets of spruce that will become resonant guitar tops and blocks of mahogany that will be transformed into gleaming, slender necks.
Atkins has been making or repairing guitars for more than 20 years, starting in his garage in Chattanooga, Tenn. Guitar makers behave more like microbrewers conspiring to build a better beer than software makers safeguarding secret codes, and Atkins is no different. Many tricks of the trade he picked up over his career have been implemented and augmented at Tacoma, where he arrived as product development manager in Not me, I just love them.
If I had money, Tacoma guitars are sure something I would invest in. He might be biased because he is a shareholder, or maybe he is a shareholder because of how he feels about the guitars.
Just a thought Are they Martin quality? Are they worth what they cost? Easily, especially the Papoose and Chief models. There is literally nothing else on the market like the Chief - a solid wood American-made instrument at a plywood import price. Plus it's an exceptionally innovative design. It's nice to see something that actually advances the design of the acoustic steel string, instead of being yet another tired old Martin rip-off.
If I was in my early 20s and looking to buy my first decent acoustic guitar and wanted one that would sound good and be a babe magnet besides, I'd buy a Chief. No question. My buddy Humberto Saucedo has one, and when we play it next to my Mark Stanley archtop it's almost as loud and easily attracts as many women running their hands over it as the archtop does.
If you can't find one locally, Elderly has the Chiefs at a very friendly price. Right, Terry? Oh my G-d Reply to author.
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