Here are some pictures of the new Baden Guitars A-Style with cedar top and ovangkol back and sides. Features include hand-carved mahogany neck, bone nut and saddle, and Fishman pickup.
MacNichol Guitars and Mandolins is pleased to announce that it has become an Authorized Dealer for baden guitars. The vision of T.J. Baden, the company produces 100% truly handmade guitars that are made the Old World way - with mallet and chisel, and features such as all solid tonewoods, bone nut and saddle, hand-carved dovetail neck joint, pre-War style, scalloped forward-shifted X-bracing, and hand-carved mahogany neck. baden guitars are handmade of all solid tonewoods and reduced to “purest, most elegant form”. The instruments lack inlay, even fret position markers, although side position markers do appear. This minimalist styling leads to an incredible sounding guitar with a minimalist price tag.
baden currently produces two distinct body shapes - the baden A shape, and the unique baden dreadnought, available in rosewood, maple, or mahogany. Both models have 25 ½”- inch scale length, 1 23/32”- inch nut width, and 2 3/16”- inch spacing at bridge.
Lately I’ve been in love with OM body guitars, and so now is a great time to look at Larrivee Guitars OM-03RE, which, has great balance and a sweet yet dark tone. The guitar will work well for a variety of playing styles, but will work particularly well for fingerstyle and fingerpicking, as well as slow/medium strumming, Carter picking, and crosspicking.
I started out with flatpicks - a 2.0 mm and a .73 mm Dunlop, and a 1.0 mm and a 0.72 Pointless Picks. If you haven’t played a pointless pick, give one a try. Check out www.completelyoblivious.com and my Pointless Picks review. Light and medium strumming work great with or without a pick. Hard strumming can be done with hands or a with a flexible pick, but I wouldn’t advise doing hard strumming with a thicker pick.
I then tried a bit of fingerstyle and fingerpicking. As expected, the OM-03RE produced great balance, along with a touch more bass than I would expect from an OM. The bass is dark yet sweet, with a slight piano-like timbre to it. The mids are mellow, and the highs have a touch of “snap” to them.
Features include: All Solid Wood Construction, Single Piece Mahogany Neck, Canadian Sitka Spruce Sound Board and Bracing, African Ebony Fretboard and Bridge, Canadian Maple Multi-strip Body Binding, Rosewood Back and Sides, Symmetrical Parabolic X-Bracing, Hand fit Dovetail Neck Joint, Abalone Rosette, Pearl Logo and Silver Headstock Border, Chrome Ping Tuners with 18:1 ratio, Ivoroid Fretboard Binding, Exclusive Tortis Beveled Pickguard, Microdot Fretboard Markers, Compensated TUSQ Saddle, Limited Lifetime Warranty, L.R. Baggs Element Notch System (Single Source), and Larrivee Guitars Hardshell Case.
