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1946 Epiphone Emperor
Needless to say, it is also a singularly beautiful piece of craftsmanship.The beautifully hand-carved Adirondack spruce top features a gentle recurvewhich brings power to the subtle hand voicing, and the two parallel bracesare individually voiced to enhance the treble and bass sides of this hugeguitar independently. The w/b/w bound F-holes are a particularly pleasingshape, and sized appropriately for the air-volume without the muddy flutterthat can come from over-sized holes. The body is a comfortable 3 1/4" deepand the 10" waist and 12 3/4" upper bout give a deceptively small feel tothe guitar when it's on your lap. It has very nice flamed maple on thesides and back, and that must have been quite a tree. The original bone nutis 1 11/16" wide. The neck has lost almost all of its lacquer, revealingthe 7-piece figured maple and walnut laminate. It is an extremely playableneck, with a mild V more like a '50's Martin than like any Gibson. Thebound and purfled ebony board has the original frets in fine playingcondition, and an adjustable truss rod accessed at the body end of the neck.The guitar has very tasteful inlays on the headstock, fingerboard andbridge-foot, in both pearl and abalone. The original tuners are very cooland work fine.
As with any instrument that has actually been played a lot, there have beensome repairs. The center seam of the top has been glued, as have twosmaller tight cracks near the F-holes. The rest of the guitar iscrack-free. The neck was reset in the mid 1960's, leaving a clean fillet ofglue around the joint. A wooden dowel was put in through the back into thedovetail, as the dovetail didn't have sufficient flare to hold at tension.The finish touch-up over the dowel is nice, and there is no overspray orweirdness to the finish anywhere. Two holes from strap pins have beenfilled in the heel. A repaired hairline crack extends 6 inches along theside outward from the heel. The guitar plays great, with a good set-up andmedium strings, and the original bridge has lots of height.
Next to the Super 400, this is the most highly sought-after large-bodiedproduction-archtop, and this one is priced right. It comes in a modernfitted hard shell case.
SOLD
