We present to you a handsome and finely made 16 ¾” wide acoustic archtop guitar that never had a pickup, having a 25 ½” scale and a hair under 1 ¾” nut width. The string spacing at the bridge is 2 1/8th”. The top is slightly translucent black, what Dana calls “transparent ebony” and the type of finish is nitro-cellulose lacquer, also known as “the good stuff.” The top and back are bookmatched and carefully hand-carved by actual hands – the top being very tightly grained Spruce, the back, sides and three-piece neck being gorgeous tiger stripe maple. It has the soft cutaway, which Italians call Venetian. The fingerboard is ebony and neo-classical which means it has no markers on the front, just black dots against the ivoroid on the bass side of the board in 7 positions. Dana and staff carved the harp shaped tailpiece out of matte finish ebony with a polished ebony centerpiece, carved the two-piece adjustable bridge out of ebony; the single-ply crème bound pickguard is also ebony and so are the six large tuning buttons mounted to Schaller brand gold-plated tuners. The cutaway is soft, which they call Venetian although it has never seen the streets of Venice, the neck is one-piece maple; the truss rod cover, she is ebony also. The top she is bordered in crème and black with ivoroid outermost on each of the two sides; the fingerboard is likewise bound in ivoroid and so is the heel cap. The nut width is a comfortable 1 ¾” and the string spacing at the bridge is 2 1/8th”. The back and sides exhibit a reasonable amount of tiger striping in the maple, and the tap-tuned and X-braced spruce top is AAA grade.
This guitar plays beautifully, with a comfortable, low, nearly effortless action. Being an acoustic archtop it sounds rich and bountiful with groaning cornucopia of acoustic affluence.