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harmony sovereign


jefleppard

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has anyone ever owned one of these? are they rare now? here, once again, is ryan adams playing one. do they really sound this amazing? or is it the miking? maybe LSG can weigh in here. whats he using to get such a sweet tone. that his partner is playing an SJ doesnt hurt, either.

great tune, either way.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=LW-_vOKxRfs&NR=1

 

and from the same show, a great improve about cher's ...attributes.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=NYJ02BWesaE&feature=related

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I have a 12 string that started its life as a Harmony Sovereign in the 1950's. An unusual conversion. The neck was widened, a new headstock was fashioned and the bridge was modified several times to accomodate the 12 strings. It is a ladder-braced big ol' dread which as a 6 string sounds good in that old retro way, but as a 12 string it is really nice. I can't tune it up to standard pitch any more but in lower "alt tunings" it still is quite lovely sounding. I would imagine that most players on stage run their guitars through some sort of sound processing but these old Harmonys sound real good on their own.

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As for rarity - probably not rare. Harmony churned out massive numbers, and retailed through the Sears catalogue and mail-order adverts as well as most big stores and wherever.

 

Just pre WWII Harmony made about 130,000 of the 250,000 American guitars produced every year. Retail sales grew steadily from there through to the late fifties, and then started to drop gently in the face of foreign imports.

 

Even so, through to the end of the sixties Harmony carried on growing, ending up with 132k sq.ft of manufacturing and warehouse space, and 600 employees. This overstretching in a falling market put them into serious debt - hence the forclosure sale in the mid-seventies (where my old H6365 came from).

 

Having said that - they have 'come back to life' of late with a range of electrics and a handful of acoustics, and they showed them for the first time in some forty years at the 2008 NAMM at Anaheim. Check out:

 

http://harmonyguitars.com/index.asp

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thanks, guys. more great feedback.

 

N!k, cool story. it seems that quirky, niche market of the sears guitar lives. a company here in canada, called eastwood, is merching the old airline line and some others. i briefly owned the stormbird (a non reverse firebird copy) but sold it due to 1) my ADD and 2) SWD sydrome.

http://www.eastwoodguitars.com/

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Some of the Chicago built Harmony and Kay guitars were pretty amazing instruments for money (specifically the acoustics and archtops).

 

Years ago I picked two 50's Silvertone archtops, one was built by Harmony and the other by Kay, neither one was playable. In the process of dismantling (and reassembling) them to make one playable guitar I learned a lot about how these guitars were constructed.

 

My conclusion was that these guitars were designed and crafted in the same manner as any first rate instrument. The biggest difference I found was in the materials from which they were built. And if you see how these instruments failed, it was most often failure of the materials (cheap woods, cheap hardware), not the design or construction.

 

After I did a dovetail neck joint rebuild and neck reset, new bridge, and new nut, the first chord I stummed absolutely amazed me. That $16 Silvertone (50's Sears catolog price) was just waiting to sing, loud and proud. I actually performed with that guitar for a few years before I got my L-7.

 

As we all have probably been accused of being guitar snobs ("Only a Gibson is Good Enough"), some of these mid 20th century "off-brand" American made instruments can be really great sounding guitars, and they look really cool too.

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thanks, larry. great insight. yeah, i love the sovereign's look. i don't think i understand gibsons enough yet to join the snob club, though. i think it takes a while, for me at least, to appreciate really fine things. i supposed i need to taste a lot of sour before i appreciate the sweet.

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