Player grade vintage"…finally explained…..

[BluesKing777]

What it can come down to is wanting a nice guitar with a nice tone that is nice to play!

 

 

 

 

Now lots of people here are coming from all kinds of directions, so each guitarist has to try a few.

 

Which I have....

 

 

But when I was a teenager, some of the guitars available worldwide now were just part of a dream of something far away and someone else's. I had heard yap yap yap small body Gibson L-00 yap yap yap country blues yap yap, but never thought I would have a few variations of it to play!

 

So again with the 1937 L-0, if I was playing a noisy bar - pointless, take the Blues King L-00 with pickup, same shape guitar, strings and things, but late at night when the war of kiddies playing trampoline in the house out back AND front AND side of my house is over, well out comes the vintage L-0 and that great tone is fully appreciated.......

 

 

BluesKing777.

[Fullmental Alpinist]

So, Tom, have you played any of the current generation of torrefied guitars?

 

If so, does torrefaction in fact help in the production of what you've described as "clarity"--does it hold promise to speed up the de-greening of a new guitar?

 

What seems a bit odd in the whole torrefaction process is that it's only performed on the top wood, not the back, sides, and (I think) the bracing of the guitar. The whole vintage guitar has, however, aged. (Not meaning to bring up the debate as to whether anything but the top wood contributes to sound.)

[QuestionMark]

The whole vintage guitar market is pretty weird, and it is a lot easier to predict the past than the future. The whole vintage phenomenon really took off in the 70s and 80s when the quality of acoustic guitars worldwide tanked. When combined with the earlier rush to acquire vintage 30s Martins that sort of started in the late 40s -- after they were no longer being built -- led to custom player/luthier/builder community outside the mainstream. These guys knew the old techniques and developed maintenance techniques while the big guys -- Gibson and Martin -- pretty much lost the formula. At both companies, it was the ALT GUITAR people that were bought in to point the companies back to their popular past.

 

At Gibson, acoustic guitars are just a small piece of the company and not a great focus. At Martin, the company has grown consistently by rebuilding past models (Authentics) and working the other end to compete with the likes of Taylor.

 

If you look at it simply from a market perspective, the thing to remember is that there are not all that many vintage guitars out there -- very few high grade ones -- and there will never be any more. With such rare iconic items, there is a tendency for their collector properties (rarity, historical function, etc.) to become more dominant than their "instrument" properties in driving the market. The collector market in general involves more $, so their is a natural evolution to higher selling prices, and (paradoxically) actually less use of the instruments to do music as a standard tool.

 

In recent talks with some dealers, it seems that the market peaked about 2007 and has been stable or declining slightly since. A the high end -- really rare, exe+, all original instruments have sort of "taken off" with really fast rising prices -- BUT there are far too few left drive the broad market. Player grade instruments are pretty much in decline with (slightly) dropping prices while guitars with serious issues (in need of rescue or unsavable) have dropped dramatically.

 

As to the market for new high-end acoustics --- don't really know, but it seems to me there is an over supply. I guess we will see.

 

Best,

 

-Tom

 

Tom-quite an intelligent analysts. Thanks. I concur with what you are saying.. (BTW. You can be Einstein Tom while I am will remain Jazzman Einstein. With no affiliation to the Einstein Bagel Cafes that exist, of course.)

 

QM aka Jazzman Jeff

[BluesKing777]

One other thing to consider with new vs old, mint OR player grade - nut width.

 

Newer Gibson standard acoustic guitars generally have the slightly wider 1.725 nut while the 50s models of the LG3/LG1/LG-0 that I own are the more fingerpicker cramped 1 11/16" nut.

 

Same with Martin, a lot of the new ones come with 1 3/4" nut like the new D18 or 000-18, while the 50s models are mostly 1 11/16" nut. Of course the golden era models are 1 3/4" nut until around 1938......... So a 50s D18 may have the tone, but an Authentic D18 can be had with 1 3/4" .......

 

 

BluesKing777.

[kidblast]

Call me Jazzman Einstein if you'd like, but, I think many of you do not understand the impact on the guitar marketplace and the future of guitars if what you are saying gains traction. Simply put, used things depreciate in value without a vintage marketplace appreciating prices of specific used things. And, without a vintage marketplace to compete with a new marketplace, reissues are not pursued by new manufacturers due to no demand for them.

 

this analysis of the Vintage market's future really is a great point. I do agree that there are implications, but I don't think the microcosm of my world and my personal take on the topic is going to threaten this.

 

I'm happy for the guys who search for years, and finally score a vintage strat, or gibson dove, or late 50s les paul. I understand the joy this brings them. I can't see myself ever doing this, but I can appreciate the rush that it no doubt brings. The shame is when these are purchased by offshore buyers, never played, and locked in vaults. But that's usually what happens more often than not. I guess players [guys like me] can't afford the prices these fetch.

 

in the 50 years I've been doing this, I've watched it go from non-existing (the vintage market thatis) to ridiculous (like in the 90s) to where it is now, and probably where it will be for the duration. I know a few guys that missed the window with some old strats and tele's.. they'll still get a lot of dough for them, but nothing like the could have done 20 years ago.

 

and there is most certainly a huge gap in the effects of age and tone between a 60 year old solid body electric and a 60 year old Marting/Gibson acoustic.

 

btw, this really has been a great topic with lots of great opinions shared. I hope I've not p * s s e d anyone off with my thoughts

[tpbiii]

So, Tom, have you played any of the current generation of torrefied guitars?

 

If so, does torrefaction in fact help in the production of what you've described as "clarity"--does it hold promise to speed up the de-greening of a new guitar?

 

What seems a bit odd in the whole torrefaction process is that it's only performed on the top wood, not the back, sides, and (I think) the bracing of the guitar. The whole vintage guitar has, however, aged. (Not meaning to bring up the debate as to whether anything but the top wood contributes to sound.)

 

I have not played enough to have a strong opinion. My response to the one I got some quality time with was that it was a very interesting sound, but different from any vintage guitar I have played. That does not answer your question I know, but it is all I have at this point.

 

As many of you know, I spent my per-retirement professional life in a research university (Georgia Tech) doing research on speech and audio theory and on associated algorithms. In that process the duel questions of what people can hear in particular noise environments (and a jam session is a noise environment) and people's quality assessments of audio signals were a central part of what we did.. As part of this, aural signal processing theory was in our face continually -- perhaps you have heard of critical band masking, thresholds of audibility, aural modeling, etc. This is the theory that underlies things like MP3s, which hides the coding distortion where the ear will mask it out. One of my past Ph.D. students now heads the MPEG audio working group -- so I guess we knew what we were doing[rolleyes].

 

I have known for years that this same theory can be used explain and measure audibility of guitars in acoustic band situations. Also, if I had put that out as a possible Ph.D. thesis, I would have had hoards of students lined up to sign up -- geeks love guitars too. So why didn't I. Well, it was sort of "Don't give up your day job." There was great commercial and governmental interests in speech and audio systems -- think telephone networks, cellphone, secure communications, etc. -- so at the time I was doing all this there was a lot of available research money and a lot of available jobs for my students. In understanding old guitars, not so much.

 

All the best,

 

-Tom

[tpbiii]

I'm happy for the guys who search for years, and finally score a vintage strat, or gibson dove, or late 50s les paul. I understand the joy this brings them. I can't see myself ever doing this, but I can appreciate the rush that it no doubt brings. The shame is when these are purchased by offshore buyers, never played, and locked in vaults. But that's usually what happens more often than not. I guess players [guys like me] can't afford the prices these fetch.

 

in the 50 years I've been doing this, I've watched it go from non-existing (the vintage market thatis) to ridiculous (like in the 90s) to where it is now, and probably where it will be for the duration. I know a few guys that missed the window with some old strats and tele's.. they'll still get a lot of dough for them, but nothing like the could have done 20 years ago.

 

 

That is pretty much my take too. We collected the bulk of our instruments before 2000 -- we loved to play them and hear them, and we loved to find them at flea markets, pawn shops, and small shops. We did not buy them to make money -- we bought them to experience them and play them -- but the fact that the market was rising empowered us to use retirement money to acquire them. We could have been wrong!

 

Our two primary musical communities are the folk revival musicians of our 60s youth and (for the last 40 years) the traditional bluegrass community of the highland south. For the second of these, the music and the instruments are wound into the culture in remarkable ways. As part of this process, there is a remarkable collection of iconic flat top guitars among my friends -- most of them have not seen a dealer for generations. These guys are pretty tough (strangers ain't come down from Rocky Top and I recon they never will), but high dealer prices and overseas interest have drained a bunch of those instruments away. Makes me sad.

 

And it has an effect on us too. As price have risen, some of our best instruments have become so valuable that it seems irresponsible to take them out to some of the places where the best music is played. We do have less valuable instruments which are in the same class, so asking the people here to feel sorry for us would be beyond ridiculous, but it is true that some of our very best instruments now seldom leave their cases.

 

Best,

 

-Tom

[rct]

We do have less valuable instruments which are in the same class, so asking the people here to feel sorry for us would be beyond ridiculous, but it is true that some of our very best instruments now seldom leave their cases.

 

The worst new guitar sounds better than a silent vintage guitar, so there's a reason to buy new.

 

rct

[Buc McMaster]

We did not buy them to make money -- we bought them to experience them and play them......

.......but it is true that some of our very best instruments now seldom leave their cases.

 

?? If you bought them to play them why does their current value matter at all? You're sure not going to play them or experience them locked away in their cases. When an instrument becomes too valuable to be played I contend that it is no longer an instrument.......it's become a museum piece that dare not be touched for fear of decreasing its' value in the market. Much like a Gutenberg bible in a glass box, it's no longer a functional, useful thing. Might as well be a potato to me.

[bayoubengal1954]

And it has an effect on us too. As price have risen, some of our best instruments have become so valuable that it seems irresponsible to take them out to some of the places where the best music is played. We do have less valuable instruments which are in the same class, so asking the people here to feel sorry for us would be beyond ridiculous, but it is true that some of our very best instruments now seldom leave their cases.

 

Best,

 

-Tom

 

Tom, I respect so much what you do with these instruments, but this really makes me sad. If I owned anything I felt I couldn't play, I would sell it. But it's your nest egg you have to protect. I get that. Still, it's unfortunate.

[tpbiii]

?? If you bought them to play them why does their current value matter at all? You're sure not going to play them or experience them locked away in their cases. When an instrument becomes too valuable to be played I contend that it is no longer an instrument.......it's become a museum piece that dare not be touched for fear of decreasing its' value in the market. Much like a Gutenberg bible in a glass box, it's no longer a functional, useful thing. Might as well be a potato to me.

 

Indeed. Perhaps I overstated. They do indeed get played -- just have to be a bit concerned about the environment when you are carrying a quarter mil $ worth of fragile instruments. So in the spectrum of the places where we play guitars -- from in the rain at the beach (we have a couple of CAs), through 95 degree 90 humidity percent bluegrass events (pretty common around here), all the way to other extreme of private events in our home -- offer different constraints. We consider a lot of things when we choose what guitar to play -- what we are going to play, who we will play with, what it is like getting there, what it is like there, will we perform or just jam, etc. There are always considerations. This one is not worth much -- but I would not take it to the beach in the rain. Also if we got rid of them, then the breathtaking, unique (if somewhat rare) musical moments we so value would be lost to us. That in the final analysis is why we have guitars.

 

 

Best,

 

-Tom

[duluthdan]

Reading through this thread makes me wish I was a multi-millionaire so that I could afford to charter airplanes and bring the whole group together for coffee, or to spill some beers. An interesting lot for sure. I love to play guitars. I m a hack player, but it brings me joy. By my nature I am a fearful guy. I used to fear the "vintage" guitars because of fear that I would end up fixing problems I did not recognize, or just by shear luck I might have them implode on me due to the eniroment where I live (semi-arid). So, I bought a '57. I know that Tom is correct in the observation that there is a quality of 'clarity' in some of the older examples, and my '57 is only dipping a toe in that pool, Having said that, I believe my fear of vintage has been borne out by the '57 experience. It has cost me $1,500 + that I did not really anticipate spending at all, to make it into a rather stellar player. In doing the work I had done I probably took the guitar off the desirable vintage status - new bridge, new bridgeplate, install of a K&K. But it sure does play and sound flipping fantastic. Glad I did it, but am fearful of trying to do it again. I also live by the mantra of never borrowing something you can't afford to replace - this even affects my willingness and comfort when someone offers to let me play their Banner Gibson, or Martin 'bone'. I usually respectfully decline. I'd love to give them a ride, but fear they would explode in my lap.

[BluesKing777]

A little test would be to see who would buy these guitars of all shapes, sizes, condition and ages if they knew, absolutely knew, that they were worth zip as soon as they bought it....

 

 

I suspect many here would......for the tone.

 

 

Where's Nick, must be floating boats - missing out on a thread he would like!

 

 

 

BluesKing777.

[Fullmental Alpinist]

Where's Nick, must be floating boats - missing out on a thread he would like!

BluesKing777.

 

Been wondering the same thing.

 

It is, however, Fall when that young man's fancy turns to exploring another use for vintage mahogany, I believe....

[Jesse_Dylan]

One other thing to consider with new vs old, mint OR player grade - nut width.

 

Newer Gibson standard acoustic guitars generally have the slightly wider 1.725 nut while the 50s models of the LG3/LG1/LG-0 that I own are the more fingerpicker cramped 1 11/16" nut.

 

Same with Martin, a lot of the new ones come with 1 3/4" nut like the new D18 or 000-18, while the 50s models are mostly 1 11/16" nut. Of course the golden era models are 1 3/4" nut until around 1938......... So a 50s D18 may have the tone, but an Authentic D18 can be had with 1 3/4" .......

 

 

BluesKing777.

Yes, this is a worthwhile separate topic. In fact, Martins until recently have been 1-11/16", and some still are. It's odd to me that they ever went to 1-11/16" and did not stay with the 1-3/4" of the golden era. Modern Gibsons are a nice midway point. I guess I'm lucky in that I'm okay with any of the three, but I think I do prefer 1-3/4".

 

A little test would be to see who would buy these guitars of all shapes, sizes, condition and ages if they knew, absolutely knew, that they were worth zip as soon as they bought it....

 

 

I suspect many here would......for the tone.

I kind of feel that way about every guitar I buy. The more expensive they are, the more hesitant I am to be careless or do any modifications, but really, I buy them because I intend to have them for life. That doesn't always happen, and I take a hit when I trade/sell usually, but the intention, and the purchase, it based upon what they're worth to me. Can't imagine letting go of any I have now, from the cheapest to the most expensive.

 

If I did buy a vintage guitar, it would be kind of on the same principle.

[Fullmental Alpinist]

?? If you bought them to play them why does their current value matter at all? You're sure not going to play them or experience them locked away in their cases. When an instrument becomes too valuable to be played I contend that it is no longer an instrument.......it's become a museum piece that dare not be touched for fear of decreasing its' value in the market. Much like a Gutenberg bible in a glass box, it's no longer a functional, useful thing. Might as well be a potato to me.

 

An example more to your point, Buc, is the world-famous Messiah Stradivarius, "considered to be the only Stradivarius in existence in as new state.It is in the collection of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford England. It was donated to the museum under the condition that it is never to be played, in order that it can serve as an example of an original Stradivarius to generations of violin makers to come.

 

Here's a vid about it (sorry for the quality)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drlMVREajlw

[tpbiii]

I doubt if many of Mac Yasuda's 16 D-45s get much playing time. None of ours have reached that point yet, and probably won't while we are alive.

 

We have bought a number guitars where we knew they were not worth what we paid for them because when you added the cost of fixing them, they were above market. Three I can think of right off were a 34 0-17 Martin, a 34 Carson Robeson (KG-11) and a 59 LG-1. We paid $200 for the 0-17 -- when they we going for maybe $500. We paid $150 for the KG-11 -- it needed a $325 neck set and refret. We paid (I think) $225 for the LG-1. The first two could be brought back to all original -- they sounded great but were pretty much unplayable. The LG-1 is shown above -- we have about $500 total in the guitar, but it has some pretty serious (repaired) top cracks. In each case, we just left them on the shelf until the market changed and then had them fixed. We still have them all.

 

Let's pick,

 

-Tom

[slimt]

I doubt if many of Mac Yasuda's 16 D-45s get much playing time. None of ours have reached that point yet, and probably won't while we are alive.

 

We have bought a number guitars where we knew they were not worth what we paid for them because when you added the cost of fixing them, they were above market. Three I can think of right off were a 34 0-17 Martin, a 34 Carson Robeson (KG-11) and a 59 LG-1. We paid $200 for the 0-17 -- when they we going for maybe $500. We paid $150 for the KG-11 -- it needed a $325 neck set and refret. We paid (I think) $225 for the LG-1. The first two could be brought back to all original -- they sounded great but were pretty much unplayable. The LG-1 is shown above -- we have about $500 total in the guitar, but it has some pretty serious (repaired) top cracks. In each case, we just left them on the shelf until the market changed and then had them fixed. We still have them all.

 

Let's pick,

 

-Tom

 

well I dont think youll see those back on American soil anytime soon.. just like alot of others.. they spent lots and own lots..

[Fullmental Alpinist]

well I dont think youll see those back on American soil anytime soon.. just like alot of others.. they spent lots and own lots..

 

Actually, American soil is where you'll have to go to see them: Mac Yasuda lives in So Cal with his guitar and banjo collection.

['Scales]

this even affects my willingness and comfort when someone offers to let me play their Banner Gibson, or Martin 'bone'. I usually respectfully decline. I'd love to give them a ride, but fear they would explode in my lap.

 

Yes, I know that feeling and agree. Back in about 10 years ago I was a guitar shop and they said to me 'try that one' pointing to a guitar sitting in a case on the floor. It was lovely and I asked how much? $30,000 (AU) they said.

Thankyou for NOT telling me that while I was playing it I replied. I meant it!

 

A few minutes later they pointed out a Gibson 1959 Les Paul on display. 'Would you like to...' they started. No!, thankyou. I had a Spinal Tap 'don't even point at it' moment. I knew that one was $600K. I left the store.

[Murph]

Y'all do realize that if the next generation does not support the vintage guitar collectible market and that if in the future aged guitars just are viewed as used, then all of our current Gibsons will start depreciating in price over the years.

 

 

This thread has been an interesting read, however I think Jazzman Einstein Jeff has a far better point than was picked up on.

 

Tom's collection will no doubt serve his purpose, and his goals because he's not a young man. Just sayin'.....

 

BUT if we jump forward another 50 years I don't see much of a market. Kids today have no interest in guitars. Zero.

 

Before you start linking YouTube videos of 5 year old prodigies, I mean in the percentage that OUR generation did. When I was young EVERYBODY wanted to play guitar, and a very small percentage of that became US....... hobby players, coulda beens, shouldabeens, has beens, wannabees....

 

Their music is a compressed digitized blur of noise with virtually no talent on the charts. I realize ALL generations said that about the next, but it's gotten to a point where I would not want to be heavily invested in guitars if I was a young investor. Learning to play guitar involves work, time, practice and PAIN to build calluses. There is less and less of any of that happening today. And you have to kill a tree to build one. Ask an average 10 year old to name a great guitarist. When we were 10 we could have named dozens.

 

Face it gang, we're a dying breed.

[BluesKing777]

This thread has been an interesting read, however I think Jazzman Einstein Jeff has a far better point than was picked up on.

 

Tom's collection will no doubt serve his purpose, and his goals because he's not a young man. Just sayin'.....

 

BUT if we jump forward another 50 years I don't see much of a market. Kids today have no interest in guitars. Zero.

 

Before you start linking YouTube videos of 5 year old prodigies, I mean in the percentage that OUR generation did. When I was young EVERYBODY wanted to play guitar, and a very small percentage of that became US....... hobby players, coulda beens, shouldabeens, has beens, wannabees....

 

Their music is a compressed digitized blur of noise with virtually no talent on the charts. I realize ALL generations said that about the next, but it's gotten to a point where I would not want to be heavily invested in guitars if I was a young investor. Learning to play guitar involves work, time, practice and PAIN to build calluses. There is less and less of any of that happening today. And you have to kill a tree to build one. Ask an average 10 year old to name a great guitarist. When we were 10 we could have named dozens.

 

Face it gang, we're a dying breed.

 

 

 

 

So who's wearing out all the guitar strings at the music shop?

 

All these threads claiming they are ruined by kids at lunchtime/after school....

 

 

BluesKing777.

[rct]

This thread has been an interesting read, however I think Jazzman Einstein Jeff has a far better point than was picked up on.

 

Tom's collection will no doubt serve his purpose, and his goals because he's not a young man. Just sayin'.....

 

BUT if we jump forward another 50 years I don't see much of a market. Kids today have no interest in guitars. Zero.

 

Before you start linking YouTube videos of 5 year old prodigies, I mean in the percentage that OUR generation did. When I was young EVERYBODY wanted to play guitar, and a very small percentage of that became US....... hobby players, coulda beens, shouldabeens, has beens, wannabees....

 

Their music is a compressed digitized blur of noise with virtually no talent on the charts. I realize ALL generations said that about the next, but it's gotten to a point where I would not want to be heavily invested in guitars if I was a young investor. Learning to play guitar involves work, time, practice and PAIN to build calluses. There is less and less of any of that happening today. And you have to kill a tree to build one. Ask an average 10 year old to name a great guitarist. When we were 10 we could have named dozens.

 

Face it gang, we're a dying breed.

 

People will always play them to some degree. It's not now, never has been, never will be, an investment, no matter what anybody tells you. You may as well have invested in Cabbage Patch dolls and be moaning today that these kids just don't care about dolls anymore like my generation did. Or Pet Rocks. Or Hummels. Put in anything you want that was never meant to fund a retirement. Sure, they go up, but they are only up until you sell it, then it is what you got for it and no more. If anyone is counting on that to see them through what could be 20, 30 years after retirement, they really did too much dope back then.

 

There are way too many ways to actually invest and make money than guitars, they wouldn't even be on any rational investors list. I have a house full of them, I know what they aren't worth!

 

rct

[tpbiii]

There are way too many ways to actually invest and make money than guitars, they wouldn't even be on any rational investors list. I have a house full of them, I know what they aren't worth!

 

I would say it depends on what guitars you have. Like any investment, you have to know the market and be able to rationally predict its future. That of course varies with time -- there is a time to buy and a time not to buy. Also it is very dangerous to invest in items which you also "collect" for personal reasons -- you have to be very disciplined and always act only like an investor when you buy with investment money. One advantage is that it is more fun -- and you probably perform better -- if you love to do the required research. Also, if you have another pot of amusement money, then you can certainly buy toys (like modern guitars) -- knowing they are not investments. And investing like we did is something that is not always possible -- at least not in the way we did it. I don't see many investment opportunities in the current vintage guitar market, but then I am not looking for any.

 

That having been said, we never spent more than maybe10%-15% of our retirement money on our vintage instruments, and even if we lost all other resources, we could easily live off of our collection for the rest of our lives. Besides my retirement and SS, we have a number other investments -- bonds, stocks, real estate, etc. -- and all have performed pretty well. So we don't have to sell guitars -- there is a good chance we will actually give them away. In an actuarial sense, our guitars have been the best of our investments it turns out -- but not dramatically best. But even with the volatility of the past 10 years, they have been less volatile than bonds, stocks, or real estate.

 

This does not mean I think buying modern guitars will ever be a good investment. They could be, but I don't thinks so for many of the reasons discussed.

 

Tom's collection will no doubt serve his purpose, and his goals because he's not a young man. Just sayin'.....

 

Thank you Murph for pointing that out. But I just went to my mothers 97th birthday party and both of the Presidential Candidates are about my age -- so I think I am just middle age. [biggrin]

 

Face it gang, we're a dying breed.

 

If you study the history of 20th century traditional acoustic music, you will find that it is repeated called vanishing but it never does -- it actually grows. I think it has something fundamentally to do with aging.

 

In the late 19th century, settlement houses became a popular past time of newly minted women with college degrees. These made their way into the mountains where a major goal was to save the acoustic music traditions of the mountains. Two of them that are still out there -- the Hindman Settlement School and the John C. Campbell Folk School -- still spouting the same uninformed alien narrative on which they were founded -- saving the music of a dying culture. In the 1930s no less than Eleanor Roosevelt sponsored the White Top Mountain Fiddlers Convention for 10 years for the same reason. When it faded, they were convinced traditional acoustic music was dead -- just as "Old Time," Country and Western, and Bluegrass was about to take off. You can see White Top Mountain from Galax -- just sayin'! The narrative of the 60s folk revival was the same -- saving the dying music. We bought into that one in Boston in the 60s until we move close to the southern highlands and found not only was it not fading away, it was thriving in genres that were far more powerful and required far more virtuosity than the folk revival. By the late 60s it was pronounced "dead" again until the bluegrass festivals took off and spread like wildfire around the country and the world. In the 70s, they said it was dying -- but then came an even more talented batch of player. This has happened over and over -- I have seen it in the 80s, the 90s, and history is just now repeating itself again.

 

Since I got my face burned off by a bunch of adolescent flatpickers just last week at a festival, I an attest that history is once again repeating itself.

 

I am solid on my history here, but I don't know exactly what to make of all this. It seems like something in the human spirit may somehow mandate all this. Also, the power of culture runs very deep, and the popular narrative from 10000 feet always misses that. But having seen people bet repeatedly that it was all fading away -- and seeing them always be wrong -- makes me think it won't die this time either.

 

You need to be old to have experienced all this [thumbup].

 

I think we will always be a relatively small population -- but I would bet it is growing, not shrinking.

 

Best,

-Tom

[Martin 1940D28]

It would be great if'n we were born with just a smidgen of wisdom. "Most of us" have to live a lifetime to acquire just a bit of it. And then you die.