NGD: Heinonen Cedar/HRW SJ - Olson style

[SiliconValleySJ]

As promised, some outdoor shots of the Heinonen SJ. The Honduran rosewood color shows more accurately here--it's quite rich. And the sparkle of the gold EVO frets is just great outside.



Hope you all enjoy!

[Glennwillow]

Hi Tom,

I am lucky enough to own an Olson SJ, and I must say, your guitar is just beautiful! Congratulations! I would love to have a chance to play one of these to see how it sounds!

Enjoy!!!

- Glenn

[SiliconValleySJ]

Originally Posted by Glennwillow

I am lucky enough to own an Olson SJ, and I must say, your guitar is just beautiful! Congratulations! I would love to have a chance to play one of these to see how it sounds!

Thanks Glenn. I might think they sound pretty similar--this one does sound very Olson-like in its tone. Maybe its the same bracing pattern and top thickness?

I am going to wait on posting a review as I wanted to try some strings that I prefer. In the meantime, here are some poorly played soundclips that I recorded:




And this one Drew recorded, which sounds much better than my playing! It's his flatpick take on the Al Petteway/Dream Guitars tune:



Curious as to what the Olson owners here think sound-wise.

Tom

[GHG]

looking forward to the review

[jhmulkey]

Originally Posted by ExpoTom

Curious as to what the Olson owners here think sound-wise.

I used to own one, and your first clip (fingerstyle) definitely sounds very much like an Olson to me. And it definitely looks like one. Absolutely beautiful guitar!

[SiliconValleySJ]

Originally Posted by jhmulkey

I used to own one, and your first clip (fingerstyle) definitely sounds very much like an Olson to me. And it definitely looks like one. Absolutely beautiful guitar!

Thanks Jonathan, appreciate the feedback. It does to me as well based on the few Olson's I've played and just wanted to see what other owners/players thought.

Originally Posted by GHG

looking forward to the review

I definitely will do one. I just wanted more time to acclimate and then also have a set of my normal strings (John Pearse) on it so I can make some clearer statements about the guitar. It's a good one so far but the jury is still out on whether it's everything I was targeting with this build tonally. I felt a little bit more time would be more fair.

[GHG]

Well, it appears you didn't like it /:

It takes time to do a review and test a guitar but it's been 3 weeks...lack of excitement or giving it time to open up?

Had you ever played a smaller body cedar top guitar? i know you like your Langejans but that is a different sound. Langejans are powerful, round tone, thick bass, sweet warm midrange. Maybe a bit different.

[SiliconValleySJ]

Originally Posted by GHG

Well, it appears you didn't like it /:

It takes time to do a review and test a guitar but it's been 3 weeks...lack of excitement or giving it time to open up?

Had you ever played a smaller body cedar top guitar? i know you like your Langejans but that is a different sound. Langejans are powerful, round tone, thick bass, sweet warm midrange. Maybe a bit different.

More the latter--I wanted to give it some more play time and with strings that are bit more heavy on overtones. It shipped with EXP16s whereas my standard are John Pearse, and I might also try Newtone's on this one too. I've put a lot of play time in already and already switched bridge pins.

I can say that I like the guitar. It's a good one, probably great--but it hasn't developed into what I had sought with this particular build yet. That's why I'm giving it some time.

I have played smaller cedar top guitars and generally not liked them. There was one Olson SJ that knocked my socks off (#1287 that was recently at Dream) and this build was an attempt to mimick that tone. Paul Heumiller at Dream said of that guitar: Jim's voicing work makes this one of the most responsive and smooth Olsons I've played. I've played other Olsons that did not impress me as much.

However, Drew had not played #1287 and was going off my description in words only. Probably not the best way to proceed, but he put in a good shot. He did get a chance to hear the Dream Guitars soundclip and agreed that my build is in the ballpark. There is one particular aspect of the low end that I am waiting to see if it develops, which is a certain type of overtone/reverb on the low E string when played open. Right now it sounds a bit tight and I want to see if the great sustain on the bass side of the guitar develops more overtones. I think it's already a keeper--I'm thinking about putting my Maingard back on the market now--but I'm curious to see if this can develop into my favorite fingerstyle guitar ever. It's a tall order and perhaps unrealistic, but that's what my goal was here.

I can also say that in DADGAD, this guitar sings. The lower end overtone is already there, so that's why I'm optimistic that this one might get better in standard tuning with time.

Agree that the Langejans has a different sound. I like that the Olson and Langejans tone are on the same side of the tonal spectrum all things considered.

Sorry for the long explanation, but wanted to be upfront about why I haven't done a full review. I can say the overall tone is warm as expected from cedar--good bass presence. The midrange is outstanding--it's on par with my Langejans--I really like it. The highs are warmer and thicker, but a tad subdued. Also seeing if those develop more with time. I'm hoping another month or two with serious playing time will allow the guitar to express its full character as I've seen that some on the forum feel that cedars needs about 100 hours playing in to hit its stride.

[SiliconValleySJ]

It's been about a month so I thought I should post some impressions of the guitar so far.

- Low end: this guitar has great warmth with PB strings on. Cedar tends to warmer, and I told Drew that I wanted this guitar to err toward warmth if he had to make a mistake in choosing one. I think he nailed it. The low end is great for an SJ sized guitar--more than I was expecting. (though not as much as my slope shoulder dread that's also 5.25" inches deep... that's not a fair comparison)

- Midrange: this is where this guitar I think is strongest. The midrange sings and the middle two strings have the loudest sustain. It's pretty remarkable how great a midrange it is actually. I'm very pleased with this aspect--I wasn't expecting this much, though I did tell Drew that this was a reason why I loved my Langejans. I think he built to that a little bit.

- High end: this was definitely the weakest when I first got it. The tone felt too tight and the high E string didn't come out much compared to the other 5 strings. Now that it's had a month of play (and a bit of surface transducers on the guitar for 2 weeks while not being played), the string is finally coming to life. The high end is developing. It's a very round high end, as expected with cedar, with a slight touch of edge from the Honduran rosewood. (which is quite glassy--when I tap it, it's about as glassy as the Brazilian RW Maingard I have)

- Sustain/bloom: Drew was building to my idea of bloom on this, which was a delayed bloom. I wanted overtones that grew over time, but not immediately. We chose a top that had those qualities. As a system, I think it still has some of those qualities, but with finish on and closed up, the box doesn't have a crazy growing bloom like I was hoping. It's about 80% of what I was hoping here. I'm thinking that this could still improve over time.

- Responsiveness: For a cedar guitar, it responds well to a light touch, so it's fairly responsive. It is not super responsive in terms of overtones coming out like crazy immediately. That's actually what I asked Drew to build and he nailed it. In hindsight, I'm not sure I should've given this direction or not. I want to see how the tone develops here over time, but I think I might've made a mistake on this call.

Overall, I am quite pleased. I don't think it beats Olson #1287 as my top fingerstyle guitar ever, but I'm doing quite well with my Heinonen. I've bonded with it quite well to the point where I'm now serious about moving out my Maingard. (Which I still like BTW) As many like Mau Lao noted, I was aiming for a goal which was likely to be impossible and a fail. I think Drew got me 85-90% there on this build actually. So while it's not a replica, it's still a very nice guitar--already pretty close to great in its first month.

I also note that this guitar really has a strong resonance point with D. That explains why DADGAD sings like crazy. (The low string in DADGAD sounds much closer to Olson 1287 in standard, so I love that...) I realize now I should've mentioned to Drew that I would've liked to aim for a resonance closer to E. My fault on that. But in DADGAD, this thing is pretty awesome. Too bad I'm not a Celtic player or I would already be in heaven.

The guitar has worn both PB and 80/20 in lights from John Pearse. I can't wait to try a few other strings on this. I'm expecting a fun ride.

Finally, the thing that was a great surprise was that this Heinonen SJ loves a pick too. It's a great fingerstyle guitar and it's a pretty good flatpicker too. Drew knew I was a picker, and I don't think he intentionally changed anything since he was building toward Olson spec, but it somehow came out quite nicely as a strummer. I still like my Langejans R6 for strumming most, but the gap between the SJ and the R6 isn't as wide as my previous fingerstyle guitars. (the Maingard and a Goodall) I actually spend less time with the Langejans now too. Wasn't expecting that to be a casualty of this SJ...!

Drew was an absolute pleasure to work with and we ended up spending a lot of time talking about tone and construction during the build process. I can't recommend a build with him enough. I'm sorely tempted to order another SJ just to try out some other ideas, but I really have no need to spend more money.

Happy to talk offline about Drew and the build process if anyone has questions.

[lightfoote]

Tom,
Very very nice looking guitar. I'd say on the visual scale, very hard to tell the difference from an Olsen. I believe Drew is a very strong up and coming luthier with all the right skills to put him on top.

BTW- what was that fingerstyle piece you played and can you direct me to where I might get the tab ?

Thanks

[SiliconValleySJ]

Originally Posted by lightfoote

Tom,
Very very nice looking guitar. I'd say on the visual scale, very hard to tell the difference from an Olsen. I believe Drew is a very strong up and coming luthier with all the right skills to put him on top.

BTW- what was that fingerstyle piece you played and can you direct me to where I might get the tab ?

Thanks

Definitely agree with your comments. I almost wish he would market himself more b/c I really liked working with him!

I'm not sure where tabs exist, but it's a simple rendition of My Redeemer Is Faithful and True by Steven Curtis Chapman that my buddies used to play back in college.

[Jobe]

Great looking guitar! And a nice honest review. I have a feeling time will be kind to this guitar. She will fall into her own. Patience...

[Neil K Walk]

OT: the pictures are now huge.

Otherwise I agree, that's a beautiful guitar and a work of art IMO.

[Johnny_Boy]

Have you tried other than John Pearse strings? I know that is what stock Olson uses and they sound wonderful but I find them to lack a lot of rich harmonics on pretty much any other guitars.

[SiliconValleySJ]

Originally Posted by Neil K Walk

OT: the pictures are now huge.

Otherwise I agree, that's a beautiful guitar and a work of art IMO.

Thanks for the words Neil. I went ahead and fixed the pictures, which I knew was overdue b/c of switching over to Imgur.