Greetings, all!

In early June, I found myself once again back among friends in the American Musical Instrument Society, though in a new first-time location – our (and MY) first time in Georgia!

Hot, sticky, muggy Savannah, to be exact (but, oh – the shrimp and grits!).

PLEASE NOTE that my “trip reports” are solely my own thoughts and experiences, and do not represent AMIS in any official capacity. (As I tend to embarrass many of them!)

And, as always with my AMIS experiences, I’ll concentrate on guitars and related instruments, with some overview and special friends thrown into the mix. Luckily, as my blog is part of Harpguitars.net, I’m happy to report one!

We were hosted by a convoluted consortium based at Georgia Southern University in Savannah, which is home to the expanded world of the Gretsch Company, and nothing I am about to explain can make this any less complicated…

Here are Fred and Dinah Gretsch, as presented to us in marketing materials before we arrived.

And here’s Fred again, as he greeted us during the Opening Reception. PS: Yes, that’s Wilson Schunemann behind him, of the upcoming Guitar Museum of New England.

2025 marks 60 years in the music biz for Fred, so he was handing out commemorative picks, which I held onto tightly.

Perhaps it’s best now to refer to all our swag (above), which tells the Gretsch story in various ways, including a handy giant timeline!

“Our” Fred is the 4th generation “Fred Gretsch” to run the company, started by his namesake way back in 1883 with general music merchandise and drums. In 1984, our Fred brought it back in the family by buying it back (his father had sold the business to the Baldwin Piano Company in 1967).

Fred immediately relaunched the old guitar line, forging new artist relationships with George Harrison, Brian Setzer, Malcolm Young, Stephen Stills, Billy Gibbons and others.

In 2001, Fred and his wife began their philanthropic activities with the Gretsch Foundation and GuitarArt. Their generosity culminated in the 2021 financial gift and entire Gretsch “Instrument, Artifact, and Document Collection” to Georgia Southern University, which also established the Fred and Dinah Gretsch School of Music. The “Gretsch Museum” opened the same year.

With me so far? Now it gets more complicated…

Our main AMIS activities (presentations) took place at the University in the Fine Arts Hall auditorium, whose campus also contains the Gretsch School of Music.

Here we are in the lobby on the first evening (June 4, 2025) with curator Matthew Hill on the left and his boss Brent Tharp speaking. As I understand it, Brent is actually director of the Georgia Southern Museum, part of the university where he is also a history professor (but not part of the music department, other than now managing the Gretsch Collection). Matthew similarly works for the Museum under Brent (who was a fantastic, super-chill host and all-around nice guy), which now contains the entire Gretsch collection…but where?!

Well, part of it is actually in the Fine Arts Hall at the University, where off in a side room, curator Matthew Hill created his brief history of drums exhibit. Since we’re here, a couple of quick pics:

OK, so that’s our “Part 1” to the Gretsch Collection.

But, skipping ahead to our eventual “Part 3,” I first want to show you the actual main “Gretsch Museum” – the one in all the media and the only part the general public sees.

For this, we all traipsed down the street from our hotel (which is 20+ minutes from the University) to Savannah’s Mardi Gras-like Plant Riverside District, a new hotel/entertainment complex owned by art collector/hotel magnate Richard Kessler. It seems that GSU’s then-president had the idea to partner with Kessler to display some of the newly-arrived iconic Gretsch collection and history, and so this became the official – well, they call it the “Museum,” the University considers it an “Exhibition” – and I’ll leave it at that.

As a permanent exhibition, it was an unusual and bold choice that certainly makes an impression on the riverfront tourists. Installed before his hiring, it will certainly make life challenging for Matthew Hill, now charged with curating the collection.

Large outer doors open immediately into the history cases, which are nicely done (here Matthew begins his spiel) … but notice the shadows far above us.

Fantastic Gretsch guitars, vintage and modern, hang twenty feet above us. Wow…but kinda difficult to inspect and photograph…

…though I tried (above and below are the two curving ends).

Luckily, a sign at visitor eye level lists them. Note the array of vintages of the instruments. (Click to enlarge any photos you’d like)

Continuing past the lobby, one enters a large ballroom, with stage and bar (Daniel Wheeldon is coming up to join me on the stage). Additional guitars line the walls out-of-reach but nicely lit for the guests.

Gretsch Electromatic lap steel and Spanish guitars, c.1939-1940

But again, any research and informational aspect is sacrificed for more of a “Hard Rock Café” vibe. One understands this a bit better when getting a glimpse of Kessler’s other hotel down the street, with full-size dinosaur skeletons hanging from the ceiling!

Matthew’s challenge then, it seems to me, is to figure out how to maintain and expand the Gretsch collection for the public in this space and/or others while environmentally protecting and conserving the instruments themselves, which the current space is simply not suited for. Indeed, I’ll be telling you more about instrument fragility and “Gretsch Disease” in a bit.

Well, I have to give kudos to the guy for his Gretsch-shaped sinks!

The final and best part of the Gretsch instrument and artifact collection – in still another location a different direction 30 miles out – is coming up shortly.

I first want to get to the first day of friends and associates and their paper presentations, starting with:

I had the dubious distinction this year of being on the Meeting Program Committee, led by Anne Acker (above) whose career and business is in harpsichords and early keyboards 24/7. Along with Hannah Grantham and Colin Harte via email and Google Drive, we had to select the papers and create the themed sessions, along with chairing one or two.

A special Wednesday evening presentation was first given by Mansoureh Sabetzadeh (the Iranian woman I mentioned on Facebook). She certainly gave us new perspective.

On Thursday, I found myself by complete chance (I swear!) in the very first session with Steven Lewis of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture. He spoke of one of just two known 19th century banjos built by a known African American maker – Lew Snowden (seen onscreen). He brought the gravitas needed to offset my “off the cuff charm” (or how I insist on imagining myself; hey, I haven’t been booted out yet). Note the Gibson harp guitar on stage that had arrived moments before.

I actually hadn’t intended to do a paper until Matthew told me they had a harp guitar in the collection – one of the few non-Gretsch instruments. A black 1911 Gibson, it had been restored and strung by an expert luthier who had neglected to replace the sub-bass tuner washers, so we were unable to get it to stay tuned for a quick demo. As for myself, I was more curious to see how that person strung it, as that was the specific subject of my talk. Yay! I was neither surprised nor disappointed to find it like most – poorly strung, and “sounding (just as I began my paper) – to put it in academic terms – like crap.”

(Silence and light nervous laughter in the audience)

Yes, it was meant to shock, yes, I (and many others) think it’s generally true (apologies to Matt Redman), and yes, it was the last thing Matthew and the Gretsch staff were expecting!

(But you can relax, as it all made sense in the end, and I got a lot of nice feedback for both the information and presentation. Even Fred Gretsch sidled up to me a couple days later to tell me how much he enjoyed it!)

The photo of Matthew and I above was taken by Susan Thompson (Yale collection), who chose it as it caught me in a passionate response to a question and Matthew with a perfectly rapt expression on his face!

But I think that the take-away I left everyone with made its mark: TO THIS DAY, NO ONE ALIVE HAS SEEN OR HEARD A GIBSON HARP GUITAR STRUNG IN SUPER HEAVY GUT AS GIBSON INTENDED (the “throw away the top string and move every other string over by one” game). And yes, this was still intended for the later ‘teens instrument (like the museum’s own) with its seeming “jazz guitar tailpiece.”

Within ten minutes after I ended, Matthew had made the decision – and convinced his boss, Brent – that they would be the first to try to authentically recreate this historical stringing. How’s that for impactful?!

Matthew had mentioned the old bridge replacement to me, and there it was, stamped: “Mandolin Brothers” of Staten Island!

We also knew the 1911 date from the stamped “1558” Factory Order Number. Even better, the museum has a photograph of its original owner!

Brent Tharp kindly sent me a scan, writing,

“Alfred E. Schwenke was born September 5, 1887 in Germany. He immigrated to the United States with his parents Otto and Sophia, arriving in New York on the ship Columbia from Hamburg on October 6, 1894. By 1900, the family was living in Pittsburgh, PA. He was from a large family, one of 10 children. Alfred completed schooling only to the 5th grade. By the age 22 in the 1910 census, Alfred is listed as a candy maker and lived with his parents at 1327 Beechview Ave in Pittsburgh. On April 28, 1918 he enlisted and served as a Private in Company A of the 317th Infantry Regiment. The regiment did not deploy overseas and was demobilized in June of 1919. In the 1920 census he is listed also as a candy maker living with his father now on Belasco Ave. Sometime before 1930, he married Jennie Coey (1897-1976) and they lived on Belasco Ave. He worked as a florist. In 1944, the City Directory has him working as a clerk in the County Controllers Office. He was a lifetime active member and officer in the Veterans of Foreign Wars. His career as a professional musician was brief in the 1910s. He died November 12, 1972 in Pittsburgh. The photograph of him with his harp guitar is undated but likely taken c. 1915 (or earlier, up to 1911 – GM). The photograph and the guitar descended to his grandson Robert A. Takacs. Mr. Takacs learned of the collection at the Georgia Southern Museum while living in Beaufort, SC and donated the instrument in 2024.”

Always helpful to have precise provenance, and we are indebted to Brent and the museum for this.

With friends in the lobby: Soureh (to her friends), Bill Hettick, piano nerd and the guy who first helped me with my Dolceola research, and AMIS Treasurer Connie Huff.

I next took in Geoffry Burgess’ paper on Dresden oboes from the Golde workshop and a joint session on clarinet mouthpieces (special guest: Jody Espina of JodyJazz Saxophone & Clarinet Mouthpieces). We sat in confining school desks which only heightened my feeling of being the class dummy.

Later, back in the auditorium: I guess I didn’t know that a lot of Early Music instruments are being more inexpensively 3D printed these days, but it kinda makes sense. Patrick Dittamo told us all about these new cutting-edge efforts.

Last year, I met this lovely couple from Atlanta – Jake Goldwasser and his Dutch wife Sjoukje – and was happy to see them again.

Jake did his paper on another rare instrument of his, the Buffet-Powell saxophone.

We ended the first day with a full hour panel presentation by the staff of the MET: (l-r) Jayme Kurland, Manu Fredericks, Jayson Dobney and Daniel Wheeldon.

This was to tell about the recent donation of 500+ rare guitars that you may have read about in the New Yorker.

Manu, the MET’s instrument restorer talked about – well, not so much restoration, as conservation. Here’s where we learned about “Gretsch Disease,” so named because Gretsch’s electric guitars are known to collectors as being much more prone to celluloid degradation than other brands like Gibson or Fender (having obtained their material from a different, possibly German, source). Apparently, some of the trick is to rotate displays, limiting exposure to light and the environment, and choosing which instruments require archival boxes (their wonderful original and valuable cases having now become deadly “out-gassing coffins” (my term, and a good one!).

They even have a new high tech laser light-degradation metering analysis machine to precisely predict what UV will do to each guitar’s color going forward – just as Gibson used to warn its dealers, as seen in Manu’s slide above.

Dinner on the river followed, as we tried to cool off on the balcony.

Shrimp and sausage over cheese grits was as yummy and decadent as it looks.

Friday morning was an early call to hop on the busses for our 2-stop field trip, which I’ll share next with a full 4-dozen photos (feel free to rush through, or click on any images to expand):

The vast remainder of the Gretsch Collection – instruments, Company catalogs and records, Fred’s personal papers, blueprints and on and on – are housed with the university museum’s dinosaurs (locked up, dammit!) in a giant warehouse out of town. I’m looking in near the entrance; the blue tables were lined with show and tell objects for us.

Aaron Phillips (from the provost’s office, but part of “Team Gretsch”) welcomes us, alongside curator Matthew Hill.

Remember my earlier case comment? Yes, all the original Gretsch cases are stored empty, the guitars themselves out on racks.

Tables filled with vintage Gretsch Goodies. I’ll let you identify each as you can, as I didn’t catch each model.

Vermillion NMM’s Darryl Martin is a guitar nut like many of us, so was closely examining his favorites.

I couldn’t take in all the wonderful new (to me) details. Though my High School rock bandmate Dave Ives played a beautiful purple-brown Tennessean, I haven’t had much chance to explore Gretsch electrics since, other than through CSN&Y photos and videos.

The original painting of 2nd generation Fred Gretsch temporarily hung in a safe place.

Display of finishes available for their Sho-Bud steel guitars.

Gretsch once had a program to air-drop these ocarinas to our troops overseas!

Original string display and packages.

Self-explanatory, though I’d never seen one.

I forgot to ask about these, which look like original fret-cutting jigs.

Gretsch amplifiers were even more rare and unusual to see in my High School rock band days. Loving the bass amp name.

Matthew next turned us loose in the guitar racks! (We are professionals, after all)

Adult kids in a candy store

We asked permission to pull out occasional things, though I was reluctant, happy to examine and shoot representative examples. Here are two White Falcon variants.

A rolling step ladder was too tempting; some of us had to get a better view!

Most of the instruments were in great shape, though I spotted various issues here and there. Imagining opening your guitar case after a few decades and seeing your once-pristine electric…

Hey, the Gibson harp guitar’s pick guard!  It was missing those tricky metal clamping pieces.

OK, I would’ve wanted this in my youth…

…or these. Darryl with a later and a vintage “cat eye soundhole” Synchromatic archtop.

More rare Gretsch amps.

Drum rims, anyone?

In 1999 Gretsch bought Bigsby from ex-Gibson Ted McCarty. Here are some of Bigsby’s own original pre-1966 jigs.

And here’s one of Ted’s own clip-on lamps.

They have no idea who made this square “snare tambourine,” but I couldn’t resist asking about it.

Another archivist (Erin, working for the Library) was slowly inventorying the vast paper archives, including endless books. It was all I could do to not make a complete mess out of the stacks.

I asked her to hold this one, so I could show my Monkees friends back home!

Next stop: We were invited to tour nearby CMG Guitars, a boutique factory/shop for fine electric guitars and amps.

Here are wife and husband owners Ashlee and Chris Mitchell.

They source only sustainable woods and ensure a tree is planted for every one cut. Much of it is Red Grandis, a type of Eucalyptus.

Their new CNC machine

Electric body in process…

…and ready for next step

Chris talks about their vacuum tube amps. While the case and all assembly is done in Statesboro, the components must still come from overseas, and he said new tariffs were already affecting their prices. Worse, he went to Western Electric who used to make tubes for guitar amps but stopped long ago. He convinced them to start back up again, but five years later, they still cannot re-create their own technology. Chris exclaimed “Bring back American manufacturing? That ship has sailed!” Sad.

Amp parts and boards for show and tell on his desk.

In the drying room he shows us ebony and the new “engineered fingerboard blanks” (I forget the specific brand).

He can also do fully custom work, showing us a new one a favorite customer designed and asked for. Hmmm…time to start a new hobby?

A fine professional guitarist, we were treated to a quick demo of the range of sounds.

Chris and Ashlee, both extremely passionate and dynamic people (how does he tone down his language for the 5th-graders?!) later joined us at the closing reception to share more stories.

Friday evening was another great dinner, then bar night. I would describe it in great detail if only I could remember (oh, those Gribbon students!).

Here’s another new BFF I had a blast getting to know: Benedict (Ben) Healy, player and scholar of the electric violin!  From the U.K. and somewhat younger than I (but “old” for a Gribbon Student – see, never too late!), we discovered so many shared experiences and favorite bands (Michael Urbaniak, who I saw live in Chicago in 1974? Check!)

His research into this world (he owns one of the five or so Fender eclectics, seen here) is exhaustive and fascinating, and I can’t wait for him to publish a book (for only he would…and should!).

A quick look into his meticulously arranged file folders; this one brings up every album featuring electric violin that exists.

And a closing screen of the many inventions and players.

Another Gribbon student/scholar and new friend is Milan (not like the city, but MI-len) Barbé from Ghent.

A lute builder and scholar, he presented on “Applying Thin Plate Spline Analysis to Study Shape Variations in Historical Musical Instruments.” Yeah, a bit mouthy, and I figured I’d snooze through it, but it really was almost as simple as implied in this slide. And the statistical comparisons he was then able to do with a ton of different instruments was impressive and seemingly super useful for researchers. The trick? Custom software to “perspective-correct” museum images into accurate front view proportions to turn into comparative line drawings (his software engineer friend did it; way better than Photoshop’s plugin).

All that aside, I was more fascinated off hours with Milan as he described his experiments with carbon fiber (and even Kevlar) in lutemaking. Why not? I know of carbon fiber guitars of course but hadn’t thought about lutes. Damaged instruments – especially the fragile bowls – are real risk for traveling musicians. As I was curious, he kindly sent me this following package of details and explanation, which he has allowed me to share with you (see, this is much of why we go to AMIS – not just for the papers, but for all the other stuff we might find!).

The following text and images are copyright Milan Barbé 2025:

“Images of the original mould. This was my first attempt to apply composites on lute bowls. The mould is made up of high-density foam and plywood to make the shape. Afterwords a special sealer for epoxy is used to cover the old and to make sure none of the final resins can get into the mould itself. This is then attached to a wooden base, which is then also coated to create a solid, airtight surface. The baseboard is added to help in attaching the vacuum bags later in the process and to make it more stable and easier to work with.”

“Images of the layers and preparation of the materials. On the left, you can see two different types of flax-fibre I have used. The first is a standard woven flax sheet cut to length. You have strands of flax going in two directions as you would expect on most woven fabrics. The one on the right is a unidirectional flax sheet. Here the fibers all run in the same direction. This is less strong but resembles wood a little in the final result. At bottom right is the first layer, a carbon fiber sheet. This adds a lot of strength and is not visible in the end.”

“The making of the first prototype. A vacuum bag is placed over the mould and is first checked to make sure we can get close enough to a vacuum seal. First, I run the pumps for a while without any resin, to get rid of leftover moisture in the fibers that can taint the final result. Then one of the exit tubes is placed in a container of resin and opened, so the vacuum will pull the liquid up and into the fibers. Once it has fully reached the other side, the valve is shut down and the vacuum is reestablished to get rid of air bubbles. Then both ends are closed off and the resin and fabrics are left to cure. Unfortunately, the first tests were unsuccessful, as the results were, although functional and strong, extremely unpleasant to look at.”

“The last tests. Here the carbon fiber was left out and a top layer of thicker flax roping on a very thin grid-like plastic was placed. Because of the open structure little weight is added while adding a lot of strength due to the grid. However, this created issues with the flow of the resin leaving small air pockets on the surface. The finished result however weighed roughly the same as a bowl of equivalent size made out of a hard maple. At this point, aesthetics was not the point of the research but strength. The bowls are strong enough to support a pressure of at least 80 kg without caving in or breaking. When more weight was added the bowl started to bend, but it sprang back into form afterwards, leaving no traces.

“So, the idea was to create stronger bowls to reduce possible damage. They are also unbothered by changes in heat and moisture and could create a stable alternative for travelling musicians. The inner layer is very dense and hard, which would suggest that the projection of instruments with these should be comparable to those of ebony or ivory bowls. Further tests and improvements are slowly being made in my spare time.”

Very cool, I can’t wait to see what comes from Milan’s efforts!

Back to AMIS, continuing on Saturday, I next chaired a wonderful 3-speaker session beginning with Adele Benoit and Darryl Martin (from the NMM) and their analysis of the museum’s Dufour harpsichord:

I’m glad others dive into this kind of thing; I wouldn’t have the nerve (or knowledge, or experience, or skill…)

Next up, another new special friend-in-the-making: Ian McVoy. He presented on “The Pedal Harp in the Antebellum Lowcountry” – that region being the large triangle encompassing Charleston and Savannah. I was fascinated (it wasn’t London or Paris imports, it was French Caribbean refuges who first brought the harp to our shores?!) as I’m trying to get back into both my harping and research on that and Ian is light years beyond, which I had only recently discovered. A virtuoso (student of Sylvain Blassel of Paris) and scholar (America/London/France, I soon learned that he was also a serious harp collector, with over twenty harps so far. How I hate him.

The final guy I got to introduce (I took this pic from my stage position during questions) was my old L.A. pal Edmond Johnson, who gave this year’s Comedy Award presentation “The Curious History of the Pizza Organ.” While there was indeed some fun, wacky stuff, I’m kidding about the comedy. Egged on after he and a gang of others visited Phoenix’s own famous pizza organ hall during last year’s AMIS, he took the now-nearly extinct topic seriously. So should you.

My session was concurrent with another that I would’ve liked to have attended (who made this schedule?! Oh, yeah – me), but after lunch I was able to catch some of the brass stuff:

Stewart Carter, above, with “Structure of the Low Brass Section of the Italian Orchestra”…

…and Robert Warren Apple, “The Surviving Solo Works for Two Keyed Trumpets.”

I’m delighted to report that Robert (whom you may remember destroying me at our Sushi-eating contest last year, and years before, an AMIS dorm roommate) has been hired by Northumbria University at Newcastle under Rachel Durkin (coming up).

Yeah, many concurrent sessions/papers this year (I also missed the reportedly fantastic “Country Harmonica Playing” demonstration by Mikael Bäckman), so I didn’t get that many photos, including the last two of the day (I sat too far back) by Rachael Durkin (two unusual inventions by a blind organist named Cheese – couldn’t pass that up) and Nuria Bonet speaking on the latest musical instrument Internet scams (buyer beware!).

And finally – the closing banquet and free bar!

Photo op with Gribbon Scholars (AMIS’ PhD student travel program) from this year and last: Haozhen Xu, Patrick Connor Dittamo, Adele Benoit, Milan Barbé, Annie Kim, Chet Stussy, Tsz-ching Tung, and Benedict Heaney.

L-R: Adele Benoit, Darryl Martin, Rachael Durkin, her colleague Richard Mulholland, and Ben Heaney. Ben is doing his PhD at Northumbria under Rachael; Richard is there as an art restorer. A very fun group of people; I gotta get over there!

Two lute nerds walk into a bar…

The serious part of the evening are the awards. Friedman Hellwig of Germany won the Curt Sachs Award and gave a wonderful speech (you can see him behind Anne and I above).

Above, Matt Zeller (Phoenix MIM) presenting the Nicholas Bessaraboff Prize for most distinguished book to James Westbrook (not present, but we hope to see him next year). Sadly, Matt announced that just a couple weeks before James got the news of his award, his friend and publisher Brian Whitehouse had passed away (Jan 20 2025).

Jayson Dobney next received the Frances Densmore Prize for most distinctive article, followed by the up-to-the-minute award to Tsz-ching Tung for Best 2025 Gribbon Paper (on “Early Cantonese Dulcimer Performance Practice”).

Yikes!…last call for open bar, then some to the hotel bar…

And that is a wrap…

…almost. Heading back to Hartford on Southwest, I got a front row seat with Christina Linsenmeyer (Yale) and her service dog Sasha!  Delightful conversation, but by the end of the flight, my pants were a drool-laden disaster.

I’m sending AMIS the cleaning bill.