Hi, everyone. I just finished the construction of a new guitar that is turning out so well, I couldn't keep it secret any longer. While the De Profundis guitar is hanging quietly, with the lacquer curing, I used a vacant mini-build-slot to put together this Siren Style S- the first of its kind.
Whenever possible, I like to build guitars on my dime, so I can try out some new ideas, follow a wild hair, and evolve my guitar designs without risking too much.
This new Siren, my smallest model at 13 1/4" wide in the lower bout, has multiscale architecture- 24.5" to 25"; and it also sports my first attempt at a "scoop-away". I've been wanting to try this alternative to a normal cutaway ever since I saw a couple of outstandingly beautiful guitars built this way by Joel Michaud. Joel is one of the most talented and original luthiers I've ever had the pleasure to know. Tip 'o the hat to YOU, Joel!
Sorry, no build photos. I had a very limited amount of time to build this guitar, so I used every available minute to do the work. So we'll just start with some photos of the Siren in the white, just before finish. (Some upcoming projects are stacked up in the background...)
The back and sides, plus the bridge, heel cap, rear headstock plate, and fingerboard and headstock bindings are Brazilian Rosewood. The soundboard is a lovely 4A Bearclaw Sitka top that I recently bought from Brent Cole at Alaska Specialty Woods. The front, back, sides, fingerboard, and headstock are all trimmed with cross-grain Zebrawood purflings. The fingerboard, front headstock, scoop-away, and body bindings are curly-figured, jet-black Gabon Ebony. The neck is a laminated construction of Black Walnut, with Movingui and Bubinga center lams.
I got the Brazilian Rosewood in 2003 at Allied Lutherie, the day after the Healdsburg Guitar Festival ended. A lot of you may recall that back then, Todd Taggart was importing tons of Brazilian stump wood, creating a temporary new Brazilian Rosewood boom. That Monday morning when Aaron and I went to Allied, there were about five pallet loads of this wood newly arrived. We lucked into a pile of cut-offs and remnants, which we figured we'd cut up into bridge blanks, binding, head plates, etc. For the most part, for all those years, all this wood stayed in the back of the wood locker, out of sight, out of mind.
Recently, I was sorting through and organizing my wood collection, and I pulled out three sequentially cut boards that I had originally thought to use for a flattop mandolin, or something like that. It had never occurred to me that I might be able to make a guitar with it! But I took out my Siren half-pattern template, and sure enough, they were just barely wide and long enough to yield a back and side set for my smallest guitar model. Eureka!
With my heart beating really fast, I ran these boards through the bandsaw. When I looked at the bookmatches, I was just stunned- both by the gorgeous figure in this Brazilian Rosewood, and also at the amazing serendipity of making this fantastic discovery- which had been right under my nose for thirteen years!
I got right to work making this guitar. I figure it took about 155 hours to build- all of fourteen long, happy days. And every minute of the process was pure pleasure.
I decided to inlay the fingerboard with these birds- swallows, actually- in Paua abalone and reconstituted red coral. These are made by some very talented artists in Vietnam, and sold by Andy DePaule and his sons. I've been wanting to use these graceful, darting swallows on a guitar for a long time. Inlay work is not my forte, so I'm glad to include the inspired work of people who can do it way better than I ever could.
The whole concept of this little guitar is that it should be the ultimate couch guitar; especially if your couch is in a recording studio, or on a tour bus, or in the green room backstage at the local venue. I've made a good number of Sirens and Falcons since the first one debuted in 2009 at the Healdsburg Guitar Festival, and they have a way of really surprising people with how much high quality sound they put out. I'm absolutely confident that this new Siren S Multiscale is going to be the best one yet.
Some of the pertinent specifications: The scale spread is 24.5" to 25", with the 8th fret perpendicular; thirteen frets-to-body, twenty frets total. I wanted to use this longer than usual scale spread for this Siren so it would be amenable to tuning down, with medium strings, but still have that buttery-smooth, easy, supple, short-scale feel.
The nut width is 1 25/32", and the string spread @ saddle will be 2 1/4". The neck is a slim, fast, medium-C carve, and the fretboard radius is 16". Of course this guitar is optimized for fingerstyle playing, but I'm sure it will have the dynamic range to handle a plectrum too. Right now, the soundbox has such a lively, focused, musical sounding tap tone, it knocks you back on your heels. It already feels very much ALIVE!
The rosette is a new design, too, cobbled together out of left over back and sides BRW, with various sizes of copper/ black MOP inlays, and Zebrawood end grain inner and outer rings. The sound hole is bound with Brazilian RW also.
The sound port is graced with inlaid Zebrawood, and punctuated with my trademark copper rings with black MOP 6mm dots. The scoop-away is capped with ebony, and trimmed in Zebrawood.
When I first put this guitar together, I was amazed and delighted with the scoop-away. It really does give full access up the fingerboard, and it's so comfortable- a nice little cove that the left hands fits into very ergonomically.
I think it was Jeffrey Yong (?) who first came up with this scoop-away idea; whoever it was, it's brilliant! I'm going to be making a lot more of these.
The frets are Evo Gold. Not sure yet what tuners I'll use, but I'm thinking either Gotoh 510 Minis, gold finish with ebony buttons, or maybe a set of Schertler black open-gear tuners.
The bridge is an updated throwback- the newest iteration, version 7, of my Talon style bridge, adapted for short multiscale.
I'm having a custom Ameritage case built for this guitar.
The lacquer work has just begun; so I anticipate that this Siren S Multiscale will be all finished up and ready for prime time about one month from now.
And yes, it will be available for adoption to a good home. If you're curious about details, send me an email or PM. And below, here are a few more photos of this guitar in its present condition. BTW, in the shots with the grey background, the guitar has one coat of lacquer sealer sprayed on, so you can get a pretty good idea of how it will look fully finished.
Thanks for looking!
Cheers! -Steve