My First Guitars

My first guitar with endorsed bridge logo 'AH' was made mainly from a plywood tea chest by my father who was himself a well respected pianist and musician.

My dad, Mel, is seen here holding an example of a Plastic Mac Guitar - Mario Maccaferris venture into injection moulding and plastic guitars

Above is a photo of myself taken in the early 1960's in Corby (only a short period after Django's death) with my original 1930's Maccaferri's Petite and Grande Bouche.   The oval hole guitar is a converted tenor guitar which I used as my working guitar and my Maccaferri D hole, model #281 dated 13/03/1934.  Life was far more simple then and I did not anticipate nearly matching the eerie image echoing through time of Django in a similar pose in this artistic advert.

I bought the Oval Hole #281 from Selmers in Charing Cross Road on 7th Aug 1963.

 

Gibson 330 1963.

This is the 1963 GIBSON 330 which I bought in Guitar Village Charing Cross Road
    LONDON
       in 1973.
Out of all my guitars (around a bakers dozen in total)!
Apart from Hot Club gigs.......This is the one I tend to use the most.

Hofner Comittee.

This is a 1961/2 Hofner Comittee thinline.
Very rare in natural blonde with factory fitted "bigsby". It has the sought after "frondose" headstock which was discontinued after 1962 in favour of the smaller "President" style headstock.

The top is made of carved solid spruce, the back and sides are birds eye maple and the fingerboard is ebony with very ornate mother of pearl inlays, typical of the 1950's 60's.