Last night I met a wonderful young fingerstyle player who plays with a sophistication and emotional fire that is breathtaking to witness. For a few years he
has played a well-preserved 1945 D-18 that his father had given to him as a gift. While away at school this last fall, he left the guitar in his mother's
study. Its position in the room was seemingly safe from the sun that came in at a certain angle. On a visit home at winter break, he was horrified to see that
the sun presents itself to the study window at an entirely different angle in the winter as compared to late summer. The guitar was baking in the heat as it
had every day for weeks. It's a total loss. He's says that the tone and volume isn't half of what it was last summer. He has taken it to a local
repairman with little experience in vintage Martin restoration. I told him that I thought that it was a fool's mission to try to throw money at it this
way. The top would have to be removed and all of the braces removed and reglued back in place, assuming that they haven't been permanantly distorted. I
suggested that he try to dump it on Ebay or craigslist as a project guitar for somebody. I thought that he might get $6-8,000 for it in its current condition.
In another case, a friend of mine died very suddenly and unexpectedly of a heart attack at the age of 52 in May of 1992. David's girlfriend had to fight the family for years to keep one of his six guitars, a favorite Santa Cruz 12 Fret D that I had sold to him in the 1990s. She kept a little shrine dedicated to David in the rear study/ sun porch that opens out to the west to her incredibly beautiful garden. Little did she know that every afternoon for three years, the sun was beating down on that case, destroying her most treasured momento representing David's deep love of the music that he played with friends. A few years ago she pulled out the guitar for me to look at, asking if the setup was okay for the occasions when one of David's many friends might stop by to celebrate his music by singing a song with it. It had to break the bad news to her that the guitar would never play again and that she should never put another dime into it.
Sunlight is not your friend.
In another case, a friend of mine died very suddenly and unexpectedly of a heart attack at the age of 52 in May of 1992. David's girlfriend had to fight the family for years to keep one of his six guitars, a favorite Santa Cruz 12 Fret D that I had sold to him in the 1990s. She kept a little shrine dedicated to David in the rear study/ sun porch that opens out to the west to her incredibly beautiful garden. Little did she know that every afternoon for three years, the sun was beating down on that case, destroying her most treasured momento representing David's deep love of the music that he played with friends. A few years ago she pulled out the guitar for me to look at, asking if the setup was okay for the occasions when one of David's many friends might stop by to celebrate his music by singing a song with it. It had to break the bad news to her that the guitar would never play again and that she should never put another dime into it.
Sunlight is not your friend.
