Used 1997 Gibson Custom Shop Tal Farlow

Sonic Evaluation

Playing this '97 Tal Farlow hollowbody is an utterly magical experience! It's everything you'd hope for in a great archtop: warm, pure, sweet, and unbelievably dynamic and responsive. It's one of those rare guitars that captures the subtleties and nuances of your playing so elegantly that you can shape the instrument's tone significantly using just your technique, which allows this guitar to lap the field when it comes to expressiveness. It has acoustic-like responsiveness and resonance, so much so that playing it unplugged is a delight in itself.

But, when you do plug in, it's simply glorious. Overall, it has a vocal quality that makes you feel like you're singing with your hands, and it sounds expansive without losing any focus or clarity. The bridge pickup has uncommon warmth and depth, with focused lows and mids and sunny, open highs. The neck pickup has a broad midrange, deep lows, and weighty trebles. In any of the pickup positions, whatever odd jazz chord you throw at it rings out with superb string separation and balance.

All of that tone talk is well and good, but it doesn't really get to the heart of the matter. This guitar pulled several "Whoah, did I just play that" moments out of me, and it seems like it has a boundless capacity to inspire musical creativity. I often talk about fretboard adventures when I write about guitars, and that term is particularly apt here, because I felt like I was discovering new ideas left and right! If you're in search of a profoundly inspiring jazz box, this serial will push you to new frontiers of creativity!

Condition Report

This Tal Farlow Signature model is a fitting tribute to one of the greatest jazz guitarists of all time, and it's quite clean to boot. The '57 Classic humbuckers sound great, and the feel is righteously smooth. It only has a few cosmetic imperfections to report: some light marks from normal use, one bigger mark on the top that is hidden by the bridge (likely caused by a freak accident where the bridge post slipped, which seems very unlikely to happen again, as the bridge is quite solid), some moderate hardware tarnishing, and a couple of tiny checks in the finish on the top by the treble-side upper bout. The frets are also in fantastic shape and measure .041 inches. It comes with its original hardshell case, original paperwork and hangtags, and a Gibson catalog. All in all, it's one lean, mean, clean jazz machine!