Used 2023 Taylor K68e LTD

Koa on the Orchestral Stage

Wildwoodians, our friends at Taylor Guitars have made some pretty ground-breaking twelve-strings over the years, but this new limited edition K68e might take the cake! It's a Grand Orchestra model made of all-solid koa, and it puts a delightful new spin on the classic sparkle and shine of the Taylor twelve-string tradition. It produces a gorgeous high-end shimmer that fills the room with sweet overtones, but it always sounds sculpted and clear thanks to the V-Class bracing. And, it's remarkably touch-sensitive, with plenty of punching power and volume on tap because of the Grand Orchestra body shape. All in all, it's a spectacular entry into Taylor's koa series, and it will no doubt join the pantheon of Taylor twelve-string greatness!

The Magic of Solid Koa

Few tonewoods have a more storied history than Bob Taylor's personal favorite, Hawaiian koa. When King Kamehameha I conquered all the islands of Hawaii and unified them under his rule, his warriors rode in koa canoes and did battle with koa weapons outfitted with shark teeth and marlin bills; heck, his class of highly-trained warriors were called the na ali’i koa! Once the islands were united, Hawaiians built everything from traditional umeke bowls to surfboards to furniture to fence posts with the strong, sturdy wood. Eventually, someone said "what if I make an instrument out of this stuff?" and thus began koa's storied history as a tonewood.

Perhaps koa's storied history imbues it with a bit of extra mojo, but you don't need to ponder the past to understand why koa is Bob Taylor's favorite tonewood and why these Grand Orchestra are such special guitars. Simply put, it is one of the most beautiful woods in the world when it comes to both sound and visuals. It has a gorgeous earthy color with entrancing grain patterns, but its powerful voice is its most alluring feature.

Right out of the box, koa sounds glorious. There is simply nothing in this world like playing a solid-koa guitar. It is an utterly magical experience. Koa guitars produce a strong, woody, warm midrange response with sweet, sunny, sparkling highs and tight, well-defined bass. And, the more time you invest into playing the guitar, sounds better and better. As the woods vibrate more and more, the guitar opens up. The midrange becomes richer and warmer, the highs become lusher and more three-dimensional, and the bass response deepens. So, the K68e LTD will grow with you as you grow as a player!

A V-Classic

We can't talk about how sweet these guitars sound without talking about Taylor's new V-Class bracing. It's an elegant solution to a problem that has plagued luthiers for decades. For years, acoustic guitar builders had to compromise between volume and sustain. Flexibility equals volume, and stiffness equals sustain. Obviously, a piece of wood cannot be rigid and flexible at the same time, so builders had to go for one or the other.

Andy Powers wanted to have his cake and eat it, too. After much tinkering, V-Class bracing was his elegant solution to the problem that has plagued luthiers for centuries. As the name implies, V-Class bracing features two long pieces of wood that make a "V" shape together. The bracing is quite thin and flexible near the rear bout, but it becomes thicker as you get closer to the soundhole.

So, you get volume from the flexible parts of the bracing, and sustain from the rigid parts! Many areas of the guitar neck that typically sound weak (ninth fret on the G string, for instance) have just as much presence, resonance, and sustain as the low E. As a result, the K68e LTD sounds supremely balanced and sculpted. When you hear one played live in the room, you'd swear a mix engineer had already done a bunch of post-production work on it. And, it gives the guitar piano-like note separation and crystalline clarity even when you play fancy jazz chords!

Intonation Station

V-Class bracing also does wonders for the guitar's intonation. Are you ready to have your mind blown? When I visited the Taylor headquarters in El Cajon, Andy Powers explained that an acoustic guitar's intonation is not necessarily just the sum of the typical adjustments like saddle height, nut slots, and neck angle (though they do play a part). The way that the actual guitar itself vibrates also has a lot to do with how in tune it sounds.

Andy told me to picture it like this: when you take close-up slow-motion footage of a guitar's top with a high-speed camera as someone plays it, you can see the top move vividly. On a traditional X-braced guitar, the top vibrates in a disorderly, disjointed manner. This can cause a guitar with the perfect saddle height and neck angle to sound out of tune when you play a big open chord.

By contrast, guitars with V-Class bracing vibrate in a much more orderly manner. The graduated braces compel the energy from the player's attack to move from the thin outer part of the bracing to the thicker inner part in an efficient manner. If you were to take a high-speed shot of a V-Class top, you would see it rock back and forth evenly in a pleasing pattern. Because of that V-Class magic, the K68e LTD sounds so in tune that it's scary.

Condition Report

This limited-edition Taylor K68e is exceptionally clean with no cosmetic flaws to report, and its frets show virtually no wear. It comes with its original hardshell case, too!