Michael Markey
Veteran
... and belated happy birthday from me too Cal .
Happy retirement too .
Happy retirement too .
John,
I do miss our obsessive shooting and death marches, but we now have very different lives.
Most of my friends from my home town actually didn't change much or even grow up. 45 years of being stuck is rather sad, but that is not you or me.
All the best.
Cal
... and belated happy birthday from me too Cal .
Happy retirement too .
haha, cal... we will have to have a grand finale death march of death marches in the near future. Hey, life changes and all but we are still crazy! As far as friends, some people do not like change at all. I see it with my friends too.
Cal,
You could incorporate a skylight into the conservatory level, for photographic purposes. So you have quick access to soft North Light. Consider photography for window placement purposes. With pull back diffusion and shades. Like a turn of the century daylight studio used to do? I'd love to have that
Today I ordered more bike parts as mucho excessive thinking has kinda firmed up the best of my crazy ideas.
I also mailed a 50% deposit on that custom Santa Cruz guitar that has mucho upgrades. One of the upgrades is having the actual wood that was harvested back in the 1930's for the back and sides, old-growth Adirondack Spruce for the top, and even a 60-80-year-old neck blank.
Pretty much I have spec'ed out a modern Santa Cruz Model "F" as if built-in 1934.
Wood changes with age, resins crystalize, and old-growth wood comes from trees that grew to be very old, like before man came to the Americas.
So now I have to wait about a year, and meanwhile, I have to find new things to obsess about.
"Maggie" had o head into NYC on the train to visit her PCP to get a clean bill of health from her doctor before getting the Cat-R-ACT surgery. I spent some time playing and comparing the two Santa Cruzes I already own. Kinda like comparing two Strad-a vary-US violins, except they are guitars. Boy am I spoiled bitch, no need for any P.A. or amplifier. I am saying that I might have to wear hearing protection when playing an acoustic guitar. How crazy is that?
The OM is made of Brazilian Rosewood (old growth) and is not really a big guitar. Rings like a bell.
So I already own a Model "F" but it is all mahogany including the top. I bought this guitar used for no money, but the owner paid hefty premiums for figured wood (flamed mahogany) and expensive Snakewood bindings, along with a dark full-body burst. Pretty much a now 11-year-old guitar that didn't get played in for over a decade. How crazy is that. The dealer I bought the guitar from did not mark up the guitar for all the expensive upgrades I received for basically free.
Santa Cruz does these old Marten clones: one is a 1929 spec; and the other 1934. The woods and features are to replicate an old vintage guitar as close as possible, but not on a factory basis. Santa Cruz is a small boutique custom shop.
Anyway, this is as if Leica designed a camera especially for me. Well in fact they did. Leica somehow asked me to be part of a focus group where we helped design the camera that would be produced and know about 3 years later as the SL2. I had to keep quiet for about three years, not an easy thing to do, but I was an insider with inside information.
So anyways, the Model "F" is a Santa Cruz design that they call a "Mini-Jumbo" with a deep body, and I'm having Santa Cruz build me one to 1934 specs. My two other Santa Cruz guitars I bought used, but this one will be custom ordered and built for me.
I'm the best for spoiling myself. LOL. Only the best for me...
Cal
I owned both an F and OM in the mid-90's. I blew through a lot of instruments back then searching for a certain sound. Santa Cruz were and I suppose still are really nice. Very lightly built, and that's why I think they sound so good. They sound played in right of the rack. Back then we wondered how they would stand up to the test of time, given how lightly they were built, but I've never heard of any structural issues. No longer own the F or OM by the way. Ha, ha, wish I kept them, they would've appreciated nicely.
Gee, does the natural light studio mean I'll have to show you how to make an Irving Penn style floor pod?
I can tell you know your guitars and love them. I find their construction, the woods used, saddle material ect., how they influence tone, just fascinating.
I damaged an ear back in the 90's (hyperacusis or tonic tensor tympani syndrome) that caused ear pain when I played music. During that decade I blew through 20-25 high end instruments, searching for something my ear would tolerate better. Most of them rosewoods out of the Martin tradition, but what an education to go around playing all those guitars!!! Many old and new Martins, some others like Dana Bourgeois, Goodall, but also a Santa Cruz OM (#876), H and F. The latter two I got from a store liquidating stock, and great guitars, but not for me. My OM was like yours -- responsive, lushness of tone, with a deep bottom end, not overwhelming though, solid midrange and crystalline trebles. Ha, ha, it too bothered my ear, which eventually drove me into photography.
Like rangefinder photography, at least the optics, we're probably in a "golden age" of accoustic guitars. So many choices. Even the big guys, like Martin, are making better instruments. They used to be so overbuilt.
Ironically, I learned later the best sound for my ears is a short scale, mahogany. Ha, ha never thought I would be a Gibson guy. Only guitar I have now is a John Walker Wise River -- a modern, lightly built J45; short scale, slope shouldered dred. Don't play it much; still have the ear problem.
Wonder where your friend Dan got the Brazilian? I understand most of it being sold now is stump wood.
I agree with your comment about finite, hard assets and inflation. Unfortunately. Last time I looked into this stuff even Indian Rosewood was in shorter supply. Wish I had kept all those guitars and Leica gadgets. Good investments as it turns out.
Ha, ha, worse guitar I ever owned was a 1962 Martin D28. Great woods, Brazilian before the ban, Red Spruce top, but a dog. Probably needed a neck reset. Knowing what I know now though, if I still owned it, I would've hot rodded it -- sand down the top, scallop the braces. Lightly built is the way to go.
Always impressed with Santa Cruz. My fave "big" luthier. They know how to build fine sounding instruments.
Steve,
My OM has 860 as a serial number. I think of how old are the three-digit serial numbers and how they may favor collectability.
I have a Pre-Ernie Ball Musicman Stingray bass. Not only is are rare white finish, but not only are the early Stingrays with the slab bodies physically different, but the pre-amps were potted, the tone controls were only two knobs, and the earliest ones are known as "BOO" bass's because the serial numbers started with B00. Also very early versions like mine have "large magnet" pickups.
I also have what is likely the very first Stingrays (1980) that features a fretted rosewood fingerboard. What makes this bass unusual and distinguished is that the body is made from Alder and not ash. Very odd and unusual. Very pretty too because it is a sunburst.
I too have discovered mahogany is my favorite tonewood for acoustics. That's why I'm all in with creating a 1934 version of an "F."
Have you discovered the story about "The Tree" a mahogany tree that was cut down over 100 years ago that was unable to be recovered because it was in some valley in Belize that happens to be the best-quilted mahogany on the planet? How about the western red cedar reclaimed from an abandoned railroad tunnel. This "Tunnel" wood is also another rare find.
Check out www.Mirabellaguitars. This is my friend Cris. He is building me an 18-inch archtop. He has wood that he got from Jimmy D'Aquisto's estate. The neck blank is "Jimmy wood" and so are the back and sides. This wood Jimmy saved for a special project.
Because I'm Calzone odd stuff happens to me. Another friend named Dave gifted me a chunk of wood that literally was like half a railroad tie cut lengthwise. I was told it was saved to be a fireplace mantle. I stored it under my bed, and one day I decided to recycle it to my friend Steve's guitar shop, then one day Steve calls me and says he took a plane to the railroad tie and discovered it is actually Walnut.
When we had this wood resawn I kept two pieces that were perfectly quarter-sawn as neck blanks. Right now they are stored at my friend Cris's shop.
BTW "Maggie" thinks I have too many guitars. LOL. She does not see them as investments. BTW she does not know about the new guitar that I just custom ordered.
So I have a retro bike fetish, guitar fetish, a tube amp fetish, and a camera fetish.
Perhaps to add on to this list are parlor guitars. I have an old "Bruno" that is a 12 fret with a 23-inch scale. A very intimate guitar that goes with the style of my Baby-Victorian house.
Cal
Sounds like you own some cool stuff and know some even cooler guys. Never played an arch top. Ha, ha, maybe our OM's knew each other when just wee little baby guitars out in California all those years ago. Hope whoever owns mine now uses it!!!
Not sure what you mean by "retro bike fetish," but I did a lot of cycling in the 80's. There's a story here. Built some really cool bikes -- an Italian Zullo Special (poor man's Colagno) with Campagnolo Nuovo Record, a Cannondale with a Super Record reduced group. Even built my dad one on an early titanium frame (an Alan where the joints were made out of aluminum), with the then modern click shifting Dura Ace group. I was really into it. Grew up around Sommerville NJ, home of the oldest bike race in the country. They call it "the Tour of Sommerville," but it's just a one day criterium. Anyway, eventually damaged a knee, got busy with grad school, my bikes were stored at my parents' house, then got busy with a career, moved out of state, then moved further away. Ha, ha, when my parents finally moved out of Jersey themselves, in the 90's, I found out they just gave that stuff away. More likely they just it out for the trash. There was a lot stuff -- tools, bike rack, the bike themselves, racing wheels. Ha, ha, my brother is still pissed they tossed all his vinyl LP's w/o asking. Moral of the story -- don't store stuff at your parents' house. Ha, ha, to them it was just a bunch junk.
Cal-if you want to see what my " floor pod" looks like, go to Large Format Photography Forum and type in "stable floor mount for 4 X 5 or 5 X 7" The pictures are on the 4th page of the thread.
MC Maggie....
Why did I have sudden vision of Maggie in a track suit, unlaced sneakers and a Kango hat and 87 gold chains when I read that?