Frank67 Posted July 18, 2016 Posted July 18, 2016 Dear friends and Heritage enthusiasts, lately the stars have aligned right and a beautiful Heritage Johnny Smith came my way. It is an absolutely stunning instrument, built to perfection, aged gracefully. What a wonderful design! There is something about the 25'' scale, 1.75'' nut, thinly carved spruce top with floater that just works. It is a feather light guitar and has a big, warm, loud, beautiful acoustic sound. The guitar is incredibly responsive and the notes seem to want to pop out ... incredible. The new owners should think about resurrecting this model. It is superb. I understand that it cannot be the "Johnny Smith" model anymore but something close to this design would be incredible and nicely complement the other high end arch tops that Heritage is building. Heritage would be among the very few who have the expertise to build such an archtop. Here is a link to a YouTube video where I play it a bit. Unfortunately, I can't seem to figure out how to embed it correctly.
Conneazoo Posted July 18, 2016 Posted July 18, 2016 Beautiful guitar and great playing. Play it in good health and enjoy!
bsck1 Posted July 18, 2016 Posted July 18, 2016 Congratulations. What a wonderful find. I know you'll continue to fall more in love with this beauty as time passes. Enjoy.
Steiner Posted July 18, 2016 Posted July 18, 2016 My, My... All natural, aw-baloney markers and quilted maple finger rest. With the black, finger tailpiece that particular beauty is truly beholding! I'm in Love. NICE snatch
Gitfiddler Posted July 18, 2016 Posted July 18, 2016 Awesome JS!! Nice playing. You sound Gypsy-Django influenced. By the way, what pickup is that? Sounds perfect for that box.
Frank67 Posted July 18, 2016 Author Posted July 18, 2016 Thanks to everybody for the nice comments! One can't beat a Heritage when it comes to guitars (I have quite a collection of them by now). The pickup is a boutique pickup from a german builder (Dommenget). Apparently it is quite fancy and has three different voices, one is a humbucker and one is a "rhythm chief" sound. Apparently this one is hardwired as a humbucker. I like it. It is quite strong and has a lot of output. Over at the Jazz guitar forum a member had another Heritage JS that had the original pickup. I thought it sounded great and if it had been me, I would not have swapped out the Heritage #3. But as it stands I am happy with the pickup that is in there and have no plans to change it. And yes - my jazz studies are mostly in gypsy jazz. I love that music. It is strong, very melodic and arpeggio oriented rather than scales, which I like. Ironically, I am not not so much into Django himself (maybe it is also the recording techniques) but the modern players Joscho Stephan, the Rosenberg trio, Birelli Lagrene, Stephane Wrembel ... I have been super impressed with the right hand technique that these people have. It looks so strong, articulate and almost effortless. I have put countless hours into practicing this. After years I start to see results, but there still is a long long way to go. But I am enjoying the ride :-)
Vanschoyck Posted July 18, 2016 Posted July 18, 2016 That's a beautiful sounding, and looking guitar. Nicely done!
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