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Topic: Namm |
Mike Perlowin
From:
Los Angeles CA
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Posted 18 Jan 2001 7:50 am |
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Today is the first day. I'm off to see all the goodies. Last year Martin Guitars has a one of a kind special D-45 with a $700,000 price tag. (That's right, seven hundred thousand dollars.) I played it, and I must admit it was a nice guitar.
To be continued......
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Jack Stoner
From:
Kansas City, MO
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Posted 18 Jan 2001 8:16 am
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I got to play one of Gibson's 40,000 Chet Atkins special guitars a while back. Sam Ash music store in Tampa had a grand opening and Gibson had a trailer setup with Guitars and one was the Chet special. It was nice looking but I didn't like the feel of the neck, but then except for the old Byrdland I've never liked the feel of Gibson necks.
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Craig Stock
From:
Westfield, NJ USA
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Posted 18 Jan 2001 5:24 pm
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Mike, Stop by D'Angelico Guitars, my buddy Glenn Alexander is importing some new ones from Japan with a partner. Glenn is a great Jazz Blues Guitarist from Maize Kansas, now from NJ. He got one to Brent Mason this year who loved it.
Glenn is a great player has a few bands, plays with some guys from the Conan O'Brien Show and Shawn Pelton (Saturday Night Live) and lots of session work.
Phil Upchurch is also an endorser.
Have fun, seems like a great time.
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Mike Perlowin
From:
Los Angeles CA
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Posted 18 Jan 2001 8:06 pm
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Well, day one is over, I've seen only as fraction of the show and I've already blown my entire budget. I bought a Jerry Jones Electric Sitar and a very good Les Paul copy by the same company that made the 335 copy I bought last year.
I haven't looked at any of the really high priced guitars yet. Martin, Gibson, Taylor Collings, DeAngelico etc. I'll see them tomorrow. (I did see the Galligher guitar booth though. Nice guitars, but not spectacular.)
Last year I felt that the best sounding acoustic guitars in the show were made by a company called Del' Arte. I haven't stopped by their booth yet, but I saw one of their guitars at another booth and it sounded simply fantastic. This company makes reproductions of the old Macafarri guitars like the one Django Reinhart played. They look really strange, but sound terrific.
The two steels represented at the show are Sierra, and the Carter Starter. (See my post on the pedal Steel board.) Gretsch did not have a Sho-bud on display. I asked Fred Gretsch about this, and he said they weren't making them any more. Joe Wright was there as always, demonstrating the Sierra, and John Fabian and Billy Phelps demonstrated the Carter. (BTW John showed me a nice lick with a bar slant.)
Steel guitarists Rick Schmidt and Tom Lattimer were there wondering around, and I met a really fine player from Japan named Daisen Hasahara. This man can really pick.
More tomorrow. Stay tuned.
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Dave Burton
From:
Richland,Wa. USA
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Posted 18 Jan 2001 8:51 pm
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| Hi Mike, you lucky dog you,going to NAMM would be to tempting for me, say hi to Don at Sierra for me if you get the chance.Dave |
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clive swindell
From:
Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, UK
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Posted 19 Jan 2001 6:53 am
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Excuse my ignorance but what is NAMM?
I cant find an answer anywhere on the Forum! |
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Craig Stock
From:
Westfield, NJ USA
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Posted 19 Jan 2001 10:14 am
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Clive here's a link to their site
http://www.namm.com/
International Music Products Association.
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Regards, Craig |
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Bobby Lee
From:
Cloverdale, California, USA
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Posted 19 Jan 2001 11:58 am
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| Why don't they call it IMPA? |
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Craig Stock
From:
Westfield, NJ USA
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Posted 19 Jan 2001 12:02 pm
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I would think that at one time it may have been, the National Association of Music Mercherchants or something of the like , then went internation and changed to name but left the old NAMM the same, since everyone refers to it as that. Just my quess
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Regards, Craig |
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Gerald Ross
From:
Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
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Posted 19 Jan 2001 12:34 pm
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So Mike...
No big announcements from Fender about reissuing the Stringmaster or Rickenbacker coming out with a new Frypan?
I didn't think so. 
Gerald Ross
Gerald's Fingerstyle Guitar Page [This message was edited by Gerald Ross on 19 January 2001 at 02:10 PM.] |
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Mike Perlowin
From:
Los Angeles CA
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Posted 20 Jan 2001 4:54 am
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I saw some interesting instruments today (actually yesterday if you want to get technical) but more important, I saw some people. I walked into the Taylor booth just in time to run into Artie Traum, the man who gave me my first guitar lesson 40 years ago. Artie is a NAMM show regular and I met him a couple of years ago and we've been friends ever since. But just like many of us here are friends, but only see each other at steel shows, I only see Artie here.
I also ran into Dan Tyack at the Carter booth, ane of course Joe Wright was at the Sierra booth as well as Mona and Kim from the George L company.
Bill Keith was there, working at the Gold Tone banjo booth. Bill recently picked up an old Sho-Bud and has started playing steel again. Hopefully we'll be hearing more from him in the future.
BTW Gold Tone makes some really unusual banjos, including a 6 stringer tuned like a guitar (I have one of these) and 12 stringer, (which I wouldn't mind owning), a banjo mandolin, and both fretted and fretless 4 string bass banjos tuned like regular basses. I thought the fretless one was a dud, but the fretted one has a really nice and unusual sound. I liked it a lot. If I was a bass player I'd definitely want one. The company also makes a banjo with a removable fretboard that can be replaced with a fretless one. It takes less than a minute to switch fretboards.
I looked at a lot of really nice guitars. DiAngelico, Gibson, Laravee, Taylor, Collings, Fox, Breedlove, Fender etc. Wonderful instruments, but not many surprises. Gibson, who did not have the Jesus guitar on display, has a new electric guitar called the Comet that is the ugliest thing I've ever seen in my life.) Martin however has something new and really weird- a guitar with an aluminum top. By the time I was able to look at it, the noise level was so loud it was impossible to hear what it sounded like. It felt stiff and unresponsive though. Martin also had a beautiful new top of the line guitar called the D-50. Brazilian rosewood, their best spruce, etc., and tons of really ornate, but (to my taste anyway) tasteful inlay work. They are only making 50 of these, and the price is $50,000. A lot less money and a lot nicer looking IMHO than the one they had last year that costs $700,000 (That's right, seven hundred thousand dollars.) BTW that guitar is still available in case anybody here wants it.
The one new guitar I saw that I really liked a lot was a 11 string nylon string fretless electric made by Godin. This thing sounds great. It doesn't seem to have a lot of practical value, but it sure is fun to play. I'm out of money, but I may buy one of these next year, even though I can't really justify it in terms of ever using it on a gig or recording.
I saw one intriguing instrument I was unable to play. This is an 8 string instrument with fanned frets that combines the bass and guitar range. It's tuned (bass to treble) E A D A D G B E. Between the fanned frets, (although I'm sure one could get used to them fairly quickly) and the extra strings, I found the instrument cumbersome and awkward, but the guy who was demoing it could really play it well, and he integrated the bass and guitar together beautifully. He played solo finger style, and I think this could be one of the ultimate instruments for those inclined to do that sort of thing.
Tomorrow (later today,) my old friend Hank Mann, who plays lap steel in a band called the Hula Monsters, will be demoing the Sierra Lap steel. I'm looking forward to hearing him play and schmoozing with him afterwards.
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Mike Perlowin
From:
Los Angeles CA
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Posted 20 Jan 2001 7:24 pm
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Today there was a Sho-Bud D-10 at the Gretsch booth. The guitar belongs to a local player named Dana, I forget his last name. He brought it for Gretsch to show, but somebody from the company confirmed that they no longer make steel guitars.
I Missed Hank Mann's set, but I did get a chance to see Gary Morse play a lap steel with Pete Anderson's band. Gary was great, but he only played a little bit. The band only played two songs, and Gary's solos were fairly short. I would have liked to have heard more.
I ran into J.D. Maness at the Carter booth. And 17 year old Steve Miller played for a while. I think it's great the we are seeing teens like Steve and Jonathan Culliver and Eddy lange and Abraham with no last name take up the instrunment. Hopefully the trend will continue.
[This message was edited by Mike Perlowin on 21 January 2001 at 12:09 AM.] |
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Dave Burton
From:
Richland,Wa. USA
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Posted 21 Jan 2001 2:14 am
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| Thanks Mike for these post I really enjoy hearing about whats going on. Dave |
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Mike Perlowin
From:
Los Angeles CA
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Posted 22 Jan 2001 1:24 pm
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Yesterday, the final day, I checked out a couple of unusual items, and some of the new low priced student instruments. Of the latter, I saw some guitars and mandolins priced as low as 20 bucks. These are obviously student instruments, but I'm happy to report that they all played OK. Mercifully the days of student guitars with the strings half an inch away from the fretboard and the frets in the wrong places seem to be behind us.
Some unusual items worth mentioning are the Fernandez sustainer guitar and the sustainiac system, the piezo equipped guitars that triple as electrics, acoustic, and Midi controllers, and Fender's new amp that can be programmed for 70 different types of sounds.
I didn't get a real good look at the amp, but basically it is computer controlled to realign the electronics to match any other Fender amp of the past. It can sound like a Princeton, or a twin, or a Bassman or a vibralux, or whatever. It has 35 presets, and 35 more slots for user programmed sounds. According to the sales rep, it differs from the Line 6 in that these sounds don't come from digital snapshots of different amps, but from realigning the electronics inside the amp. I'm not sure what the difference is.
A local store ordered one of these amps and I'll have a chance to check it out at some future point.
The Fernandez sustainer guitar, and the sustainiac have been around for a few years. The Fernandez sustainer guitar basically has a built in E-bow. I have one of these and while I wouldn't want it to be my only guitar, it's a nice addition to the collection, and a very practical tool for recording purposes. The sustainiac is the same system that can be installed in other guitars.
For the last few years there have been guitars available with piezo equipped bridges that simulate an acoustic guitar sound. Two companies, Godin and Brian Moore, have taken this idea one step further. In these guitars, the piezos, a seperate one for each string, have been wired to MIDI outputs so the guitar also functions as a synth controller. The guitars have have scrolling controls on their faces so the player can control the patch from the guitar instead of (or in addition to) using foot controls. This the instrument can function as a normal electric guitar, an acoustic, guitar, a synth guitar or any combination of any of the three, in any degree of balance.
At the other extreme, one thing I noticed was a larger than usual selection of acoustic instruments. Not just guitars, but banjos, dobros and mandolins. I also saw a substantial number of younger musicians playing old timey and bluegrass. It's nice to see traditional music making a comeback.
Now after 4 days of running around with no sleep, I'm going to take a nap.
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John Rickard
From:
Phoenix (It's A Dry Heave) AZ
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Posted 24 Jan 2001 3:42 am
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There was a Sho-Bud at the Gretsch booth on friday, then it vanished. I have photos to prove it. Just got home, I'll put them up later.
JR
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Slide It On Over
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Al Marcus
From:
Cedar Springs,MI USA (deceased)
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Posted 26 Jan 2001 11:55 am
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Hi Jack, did you every put your left hand around a Gibson L5 ? I had one and it was a pleasure to use that neck. The best ever. I sold it in the 50's for $295. I should have kept it!!.
Craig- That name originally was National Association of Music _Manufacturers_. NAMM.
I attended their convention in 1953 in Chicago, when I was on a buying trip to open my Music Store.
It was originally a show by MFGs to show their new wares to Distributors, not to retailers.
But Retailers were invited by invitation. Gibson invited me.
I was teaching and playing their guitars, and my Gibson Pre-War Electra-Harp.
I remember they were showing different steels with lever tune changers, one with solonoid buttons, I think it was a Magnatone..
National had one with two pedals, 4 changes, you push forward for one and back for another and same with the other foot. Also they showed the new Lowrey Organs, which I was a franchised dealer...al |
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