1 year today owning my SJ-200

[Glennwillow]

Lovely guitar, Bruce! And you look great playing it!

Good for you!

- Glenn

[Highroller]

One of my few remaining bucket-list guitars to buy, and that one's a beauty for sure. Happy Anniversary!

[ghostnote]

That is (still) beautiful. I can't think of a guitar whose looks I like more, and I also love the way they sound. Every time you post a pic of yours, it ramps my GAS up to new heights...
And congrats on the weight loss, not an easy thing to do at our age.

[TRose]

Happy Anniversary to you both. That’s one big guitar!
Excellent work on your reformed physique. Proud for you.

[zombywoof]

Originally Posted by SuperB23

Nice review Bruce, I recently played a short scale actual 1957 Gibson SJ-200 at Sylvan Music and was just blown away by it. I have been curious to hear how close these new Historic Custom Shop models are to the old ones. The old ones came short scale some times, I wish they had that as an option on the newer ones too.

I have run across another 1957 which had short scale so apparently Gibson was experimenting with going that route. A '57 though was a different beast from the Bozeman version being built with a laminate maple back and rim and with a unique bracing. Lots of it with a wide angle X brace above and below the soundhole and ladder mounted tone bars which was a return to how the pre-War SJ-200s guitars had been built.

Structurally speaking Bozeman would have been more on the mark if they had labeled the model an Historic 1950 J200 as following WWII until sometime in 1951 they were built with solid maple bodies and a single X brace. Go figure.

[Sugar Bear]

That is just beautiful! Congratulations. Being a Gibson nut myself, one of those is on my list. I tend to focus on Jumbo types, but I eventually want to get a Super Jumbo. Enjoy that beauty!

[zombywoof]

I always appreciate it when somebody gives a review of how they feel about a guitar a year or so down the road. The honeymoon period is over and they have had enough time to putz around with strings, setups and such so see just what a guitar can do. You are starting to sound like my wife a bit though. In more years than I can recall her one and only six string has remained that J200. She had found nothing no matter what the price tag she has liked better. It was actually my guitar but early on when I told her I was thinking of trading it in for something else she let me know in no uncertain terms that if I wanted to stay married that J200 was going no place. How could you not love a woman like that.

And congrats on the weight loss. I shed pounds when I was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. I figured eating better was preferable to having to go with shots and an inhaler.