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1948/08 D-28

My Martin D-28 is a re-topped 1948.  I had her done up in 30’s style Sunburst .  She is an amazingly big sounding guitar.  Takes her about 10 minutes to warm up the top and then she booms and pops with youthful vigor.  It is the best sounding guitar I’ve ever played – seriously. I got really lucky in that.  You never really know what a guitar will sound like when its been rebuilt.  It’s essentially a new guitar.

I got it in a trade and it turned out its top had had some significant work done and it was kind of a mess. I had the $ at the time so after many hours of deliberation and research I decided what to do with her. I was to build a dream Martin guitar – In this case a pre-war style D-28 from a post-war body. Built like a 19

These guitars back and sides are Brazilian rosewood and there is simply no acoustic tone comparison to aged old growth Brazilian rosewood. The warm, deep mellow and crisp sound that projects from the back and sides is tremendous and unparalleled. David Eichelbaum (the luthier) and I talked at length about the details of what he was to build. He is a master luthier and repairmen. In addition to his outstanding repair work his own guitars are flawless and gorgeous works of art.

There are a lot of little details that come to play when building a guitar. Things like trim style, tuners, fret size, inlays and of course the top wood. There are some noticeable sonic differences between tone woods. Since I decided that I wanted to make a pre-war style Dreadnaught. (forward shifted and scalloped braces Adirondack spruce top, hide glue)

I had David) find the best top wood he could. He made a few calls and pulled a few favors and found a supreme Adirondack/Red Spruce top pulled from the hands of the finest tone wood supplier in the world. I had never before seen such flawless wood. If there was ever a more perfect set of spruce boards, split and matched as to appear from one piece it was matched by this selection.

And off to work david went.