Guitars

Rather than develop an original concept for electric guitars I currently build in Les Paul, Telecaster, or Stratocaster styles. My Les Paul style guitars are typically chambered to relieve weight and I prefer a slightly longer 25” or 25.5” Fender scale length though I can easily build to the standard 24.75” Gibson spec. The longer scale length in combination with full-length carbon-fiber neck rods eliminate dead spots and maintain definition across the entire sonic range. While I can install any pickup combination of choice, I prefer to hand-wind slightly mismatched, unpotted coils for improved touch response and clarity.

My Fender-style guitars are fairly standard except for full-length carbon-fiber neck reinforcements and back-tilted instead of flat headstocks. Unless the body is semi-hollow, thinline-style, or chambered I use quality third-party bodies to pair with the handmade necks. My end-goal is simply for a quintessential Strat or Tele sound except with more consistency and comfort than a standard Fender build.

Basses

While my basses with Dammann instruments are unconventional, my personal basses are more traditional derivatives of the basic P and J bass. I build in both neck-through and bolt-on styles depending on user preference and prefer carving away at the contours for looks and feel rather than leave flat body features. I also typically chamber the body to relieve weight. Compared to my electric guitars I feature more laminates along with more figured and multiple-colored woods in-line with contemporary bass designs. I use a 34” scale length as standard though will use 35” for 5-string basses if the extra stretch isn’t a problem.

For passive basses and a vintage tone I prefer hand-winding pickups to vintage spec, but for active basses my favorite combination is pairing Bartolini pickups with Audere preamps. The bass necks use full-length carbon-fiber roads as used in all my other instruments. With this arrangement I don’t find dual-truss rods necessary in 5 or 6-string basses but can install a pair of double-acting, low-profile truss rods upon request.