C. F. Martin & Company

C. F. Martin & Company

File:Martin.png
Industry	Guitar Manufacturing
Founded	1833, Nazareth, Pennsylvania
Founder	Christian Frederick Martin
Headquarters	Nazareth, Pennsylvania, United States
Products	Guitars, Ukuleles, Bass guitars
Website	martinguitar.com

C.F. Martin & Company is a U.S. guitar manufacturer established in 1833 by Christian Frederick Martin. Martin is highly regarded for its steel-string guitars and is a leading mass-manufacturer of flattop acoustics. Martin instruments can cost thousands of dollars and vintage instruments often cost six figures. The company has also made several models of electric guitars and electric basses.

The company's headquarters and primary factory are in Nazareth, Pennsylvania, located in the Lehigh Valley region of the state. Martin also manufactures instruments in Mexico. Martin produced 182 instruments during 1900, increasing to 24,085 in 2000.

Front detail of a CF Martin 000-28EC, showing the solid Sitka spruce soundboard, inlaid herringbone rosette and characteristic "comma-shaped" pick guard.

Company history

The company has been run by the Martin family throughout its history. The current chairman and CEO, C.F. 'Chris' Martin IV, is the great-great-great-grandson of the founder. The firm was the first to introduce many of the characteristic features of the modern flattop, steel-strung acoustic guitar. Influential innovations include the Dreadnought body style and scalloped bracing. Some time in the 1970s, Martin bought Levin guitars and around 200 D-18's were apparently built in Sweden; they are stamped LD-18.

Founding

C. F. Martin was born in 1796 in Markneukirchen, Germany and came from a long line of cabinet makers and woodworkers. His father, Johann Georg Martin, also built guitars. By the age of 15, C. F. Martin was supposedly apprenticed to Johann Georg Stauffer, a well-known guitar maker in Vienna, Austria, although this claim has never been corroborated by Viennese primary sources. The identity of Stauffer's five apprentices in 1811 is documented, Martin was not among them. Martin returned to his hometown after completing training and opened his own guitar-making shop. However, he soon became embroiled in a controversy between two guilds.

At that time European craftsmen operated under the guild system. The guitar (in its modern form) was a relatively new instrument, and most guitar makers were members of the Cabinet Makers' Guild. The Violin Makers' Guild claimed exclusive rights to manufacture musical instruments. The Violin Makers' Guild filed appeals on three occasions - the first in 1806 - to prevent cabinet makers from producing guitars. Johann Martin is mentioned in a surviving submission dated 1832.

Although the cabinet makers successfully defended their right to build guitars, C. F. Martin decided that the guild system was too restrictive. He moved to New York City In 1833 and by 1838 he moved his business to Nazareth, PA.

Company

The Martin company is generally credited with developing the X-bracing system during the 1850s, although C. F. Martin did not apply for a patent on the new bracing system. During the 1850s, X-bracing was used by several makers, all German immigrants who knew each other, and according to historian Philip Gura there is no evidence that C. F. Martin invented the system. The Martin company was the first to use X-bracing on a large scale, however.

From the 1860s on, fan bracing became standard in Europe. Martin and other American builders including Washburn and others since forgotten (Schmidt & Maul, Stumcke, Tilton) used X-bracing instead. The sound of X-bracing may be considered less delicate with gut strings, but it prepared the American guitar for steel strings, which emerged in the first quarter of the 20th century.

Growing popularity of the guitar in the early 1900s, fueled by the growing popularity of folk music and country and western music, led to a demand for louder and more percussive guitars. In response, many companies began to use metal strings instead of catgut. These became known as steel-string guitars. By 1921, Martin had focused production towards this type of guitar.

The company's reputation and output continued to grow. Forays into mandolin making in the late 1890s and ukulele making in the 1920s greatly contributed to their expansion, and by 1928 they were making over 5000 instruments per year. The ukulele was responsible for keeping the company profitable in the 1920s. The company remained family-owned and employed a relatively small number of highly trained craftsmen making instruments primarily by hand. By the early 1960s Martin guitars were back-ordered by as much as three years due to limited production capacity. In 1964, Martin opened a new plant that is still the primary Martin production facility.

One of the consistent policies of the company was to not engage in endorsement deals. At the same time, they offered a 20% discount as a courtesy to professional musicians. They would also offer to customize instruments with inlays of names for the performers.

Innovations

The Great Depression in 1929 affected Martin's sales drastically. The company came up with two innovations to help regain business.

One of these was the 14-fret neck, which allowed easier access to higher notes. Martin intended it to appeal to plectrum banjo players interested in switching to guitar for increased work opportunities. Martin altered the shape of its 0-size guitar body to allow a 14-frets-clear tenor neck. This was in response to specific requests from tenor players including Al Esposito, the manager of the Carl Fischer store in New York City. The "Carl Fischer Model" tenors were soon renamed 0-18T. This was the first time Martin altered one of their original body shapes to accommodate a longer neck with more frets clear of the body. A 1955 version of the 0-15 is the favorite guitar of artist Leroy Powell. He tells American Songwriter “It’s my main axe that I play with around the house...I even took it out when I toured with Kid Rock … it’s held up pretty good for how old it is.”

It was also during this time that Perry Bechtel, a well-known banjo player and guitar teacher from Cable Piano in Atlanta, requested that Martin build a guitar with a 15-fret neck-to-body join. Most guitars of the day, with the exception of Gibson's L-5 archtop jazz guitars, had necks joined at the 12th fret, half the scale length of the string. In keeping with Bechtel's request, Martin modified the shape of their 12-fret 000-size instrument, lowering the waist and giving the upper bout more acute curves to cause the neck joint to fall at the 14th fret rather than the 12th. Fourteen-fret guitars were designed to be played with a pick and replace banjos in jazz orchestras. Thus, Martin named its first 14-fret, 000-shape guitar the Orchestra Model (OM). Martin applied this term to all 14-fret instruments in its catalogs by the mid- to late-1930s.

Original Martin OMs from approximately 1929 to 1931 are extremely rare and sell for high prices. Many guitarists believe that the OM—a combination of Martin's modified 14-fret 000 body shape, long scale (25.4") neck, solid headstock, 1-3/4" nut width, 4-1/8" maximum depth at the endwedge, and 2-3/8" string spread at the bridge—offers the most versatile combination of features available in a steel-string acoustic guitar. Today, many guitar makers (including many small shops and hand-builders) create instruments modeled on the OM pattern.

The change in body shape and longer neck became so popular that Martin made the 14-fret neck standard on all of its guitars and the rest of the guitar industry soon followed. Classical guitars, which were evolving on their own track largely among European builders, retained the 12-fret neck design.

Martin's second major innovation, and arguably the more important, of the period 1915-1930 was the dreadnought guitar. Originally devised in 1916 as a collaboration between Martin and a prominent retailer, the Oliver Ditson Co., the dreadnought body style was larger and deeper than most guitars. In 1906, the Royal Navy launched a battleship that was considerably larger than any before it. From the idea that a ship that big had nothing to fear (nought to dread), it was christened HMS Dreadnought. Martin borrowed this name for their new, large guitar. The greater volume and louder bass produced by this expansion in size was intended to make the guitar more useful as an accompaniment instrument for singers working with the limited sound equipment of the day. Initial models produced for Ditson were fan-braced, and the instruments were poorly received.

In 1931, Martin reintroduced the dreadnought with X-bracing and two years later gave it a modified body shape to accommodate a 14-fret neck, and it quickly became their best-selling guitar. The rest of the industry soon followed, and today the "dreadnought" size and shape is considered one of the "standard" acoustic guitar shapes, iconic for its use in a wide variety of musical genres.

Martin also developed a line of archtop instruments during the 1930s. Their design differed from Gibson and other archtops in a variety of respects–the fingerboard was glued to the top, rather than a floating extension of the neck, and the backs and sides were flat rosewood plates pressed into an arch rather than the more common carved figured maple. Martin archtops were not commercially successful and were withdrawn after several years. In spite of this, during the 1960s, David Bromberg had a Martin archtop converted to a flat-top guitar with exceptionally successful results, and as a result, Martin has recently begun issuing a David Bromberg model based on this conversion.

During this time, Martin also continued to make ukuleles, tiples, and other stringed instruments.

The 1960s

During the late 1960s, Martin manufactured hollow-body electric guitars similar to those manufactured by Gretsch. Martin's electric guitars were not popular and the company has since continued to concentrate on the manufacture of a wide range of high quality acoustics. They also reinstated the famous D-45 in 1968.

During the 1960s, many musicians preferred Martin guitars built before World War II to more recent guitars of the same model. The pre-War guitars were believed to have internal bracing carved more skillfully than later instruments, producing better resonance, and tops made from Adirondack red spruce rather than Sitka spruce. Additionally, 1970s Martin dreadnoughts suffered from poor intonation in the higher registers. Some luthiers and repairmen attribute this to a gradual trend of misplacing the bridge on these guitars: the same jigs for bridge placement were used throughout the history of each model's production. As the amount of production increased from the Martin factory, the jigs eroded, resulting in inaccurate bridge placement. This was eventually identified and corrected.

Recent events

Martin opened its "Custom Shop" division in 1979. Martin built its 500,000th guitar in 1990, and in 2004 they built their millionth guitar. This guitar is entirely hand-crafted and features more than 40 inlaid rubies and diamonds. It is worth an estimated $1,000,000. As of 2007, Martin employs 600 people. Thirteen workers are devoted to quality assurance. In October, 2009, Martin purchased at auction a D-28 that was played by Elvis Presley in his last concert for $106,200.

Steel string guitar stress

A luthier finishes the heel of a guitar at the Martin Guitar factory in Nazareth, PA (February 2008)

A steel-string guitar tuned to concert pitch endures a tension of about 180 pounds (800 N) on the top of the guitar from the strings. The X-bracing system has been shown to be an efficient technique for preventing the top of the guitar from warping under this force. The braces are generally carved, scalloped and tuned to improve resonance and integrity of the guitar top, such capability being performed by skilled artisans and not readily reproducible by machine. This work is an important factor in determining the timbre of the guitar and a major determinant in the observation that rarely do two guitars ever sound alike, even though they are ostensibly identical in construction.

Models

Six-string guitars

For many years, Martin has used a model-labeling system featuring an initial letter, number, or series of zeros specifying the body size and type; traditionally 5- is the smallest (and technically a terz, tuned a minor third higher than a guitar, at GCFA#DG), advancing in size through 4-, 3-, 2-, 1-, 0-, 00- and 000- (though these are commonly referred to as "Oh", "triple-oh", etc. they are, in fact, denoted by zeros, keeping the numerical-size theme constant. These instruments originally had in common a neck that joined the body at the 12th fret. In 1916 Martin contracted with Ditson's music store to produce a much larger store-badged guitar to compete sonically in ensembles; this boxy thunderer was named the Dreadnought in honor of the most horrific weapons system of the day, a British Navy battleship so large it could fear nothing, or "dread nought". Indeed, HMS Dreadnought was its name, and it proved an apt product tie-in between the huge ship and the huge guitar. In 1931, Martin introduced D-bodied guitars under their own name, and a new standard was set. Around the same time, to meet the needs of banjo players wanting to cash in the guitar's new popularity, Martin unveiled a second line of letter-named guitars, the OMs. Taking the body of the 000-, squaring its shoulder to meet the body at the 14th fret, and lengthening the scale, they created a truly legendary line of instruments (OM- wood-and-trim packages ranged from the plain -18 (mahagony back and sides) and -21 (with rosewood) to the extremely ornate OM-45. The 14-fret body of the OMs proved so popular that it quickly became the standard for 00-, 000-, and D- models as well. There things stayed for about 45 years; then, in 1976, Martin debuted the M-36 and M-38. Keeping the narrow-waisted shape and moderate depth of the 000-, and combining it with a width slightly more than even that of a D-, the M-s (sometimes called 0000-) were phenomononally well-balanced in their tone. These have lately been joined by the Gibson-Jumboesque J, and the even larger SJ. The numbers/letters denoting body size and shape are generally followed by a number that designates the guitar's ornamentation and style, including the species of wood from which the guitar is constructed. Generally, the higher the number, the higher the level of ornamentation. Additional letters or numbers added to this basic system are used to designate special features (such as a built-in pickup or a cutaway).

Martin also periodically offers special models. Many of these have a limited production run, or begin as a limited-production guitar that sells well enough to become regularly produced. Many of these special models are designed with, endorsed by, and named after well-known guitarists such as Eric Clapton, Clarence White, Merle Haggard, Stephen Stills, Paul Simon, Arlo Guthrie and Johnny Cash. In 1997, Martin launched its "Women in Music" series, which was followed in 1998 by the Joan Baez Signature guitar, a replica of the 0-45 Baez began her career with. Martin has also worked with newer acts and more "up and coming" musicians to create custom series guitars. Players such as pop/blues icon John Mayer, English pop/folk singer Ed Sheeran, and Canadian folk artist City and Colour, have all collaborated with Martin's luthiers in the building of their own custom series instruments. Martin’s immediate recognition in the music industry as a classic, incomparable guitar maker is still growing today, as they continue to collaborate with emerging and successful artists alike.

Roger McGuinn worked with C. F. Martin & Company to develop a seven-string folk guitar. McGuinn's guitar (the HD-7) is tuned the same as a standard folk guitar with steel strings, but the third (G) string is augmented with a harmonic string one octave higher. The intention was to offer the six-string player the chance to play "jangly" twelve-string style lead guitar.

000-15 in Geib style hardshell case.

000-28EC in Geib-style hardshell case.

HD-28 Dreadnought in moulded case.

As of 2005, Martin offers over 180 different guitars. Some of the more notable models are:

• 000-1: Slightly smaller in all dimensions than a dreadnought guitar (the "standard" acoustic guitar), solid Sitka spruce top, solid mahogany back, laminated mahogany sides, tortoiseshell binding, rosewood fingerboard.
• 000-15: Base model of the upper end Martin Guitar line. All mahogany or sapele construction. 'A Frame' "X" top bracing, 14 frets clear, Optional model 000-15S 12 frets clear. All -16 and -16 series 000 instruments have long scales (25.4") and 1-11/16" nut widths, in contrast to the -18, -28, and -45 series, which have the 'traditional' 24.9" 000 scale, retaining the 1-11/16" nut width.
• 000-28EC and 000-28ECB: Two of the five "Eric Clapton" models. Same body size as the 000-15, but with the Martin short scale (24.9"). This artist signature model is constructed with higher-quality woods (especially the more expensive 000-28ECB constructed from Brazilian Rosewood, hence the "B"), a different shape to the neck, and more ornamentation around the edge of the body.
• 000-18: Mahogany body guitar similar to the 000-28, but with more warmth, brought by the lower frequencies available to mahogany.
• The 000-28EC is one of Martin's most popular guitars; unlike the bigger dreadnoughts, the 000-28EC is nearer to the size of a Spanish guitar, with a slimmer body and wider fretboard.
• D-1: All solid dreadnought with a spruce top and sapele back and sides. The D-1, as stated above, was Martin's first Dreadnought, originally built for the Oliver Ditson Company.
• D-18: Dreadnought guitar, solid Sitka spruce top, solid mahogany back and sides, ebony fingerboard and bridge, forward-shifted scalloped bracing.
• D-28: Dreadnought guitar, solid Sitka spruce top, solid East Indian rosewood (Brazilian rosewood before 1969) back and sides, ebony fingerboard, black and white binding and ornamentation with 5/16" non-scalloped braces. The D-28 has become Martin's signature guitar.
• The HD-28, introduced in 1976 replicates pre-1947 "'bone" D-28s with herringbone purfling (then manufactured only in pre-war Germany) and scalloped braces. It is an extremely popular guitar with a full sound, good balance between bass and treble.
• D-35: Introduced in the mid-1960s, has a distinctive 3-piece solid East Indian Rosewood back, black and white binding on body and neck with 1/4" braces.
• HD-35: Similar material and style to the HD-28, but has a distinctive 3-piece solid East Indian Rosewood back and 1/4" scalloped braces.
• D-45: A luxuriously ornamented version of the D-28. First made for Gene Autry. Pre-World War II D-45s (only 91 were made) are the most expensive guitars in the United States.
• J-40: a "Jumbo" sized guitar, "0000" body profile but with the same depth as a Dreadnought (4-7/8"). It uses woods similar to those used in the D-28, but with the addition of scalloped bracing. Its ornamentation is similar to the D-45, but lacks the abalone in the body binding.
• OM-28: Similar to the 000-28 model in body size and ornamentation, but uses a 25.4" scale, 1-2/4" nut spacing, and 2-3/8" string spacing at the bridge. Also known as the "orchestra" model, so named because of its association with banjo players transitioning to guitar in the late 1920s and early 1930s. The 14-fret neck-to-body design was designed to allow greater upper fret access, and thus feel more comfortable to banjo players accustomed to full access the length of a 24-fret + neck.
• OM-42PS: Paul Simon's signature acoustic model (manufactured in the 1997 model year) is based on the OM-42, which had not been manufactured since 1930. Alterations were specifically requested by Simon himself. From the original planned run of approximately 500, only 223 were produced, making these a collector's item. A standard version of the OM-42 is in the current range.
• 16-Series: Style 16 guitars were first introduced in 1961. Later, they were the first production Martins to utilize sustainable, native woods such as ash and walnut, as well as the first to implement hybrid A-frame "X" bracing. Today, these models use solid woods such as mahogany, East Indian rosewood, koa, sapele and maple. Models include DC-16RE Aura, OMC-16E Koa, D-16 GT, 000C-16RGTE Aura and the J12-16GT, a 12-string jumbo-size guitar with the series 16 appointments. Most -16 series instruments use the Martin long scale, 25.4".
• 15 Series: Constructed of solid all mahogany woods, featuring herringbone rosette decal (not an inlay), matte finish and A-frame "X" bracing. Fingerboards on older models are katalox, newer versions are Indian rosewood. Models include D-15 and OMC-15E. Also acoustic bass guitar BC-15E. John Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers favors this series, himself owning two vintage O-15 acoustics. Used on solo albums (most notably on Curtains) and albums with the band (like the recent Stadium Arcadium), Frusciante's O-15s can be seen in action during live performances of songs, including Venice Queen (most memorably at Slane Castle) and Desecration Smile. Chris Martin of Coldplay also uses Martin & Co. 15-series, which can be seen during Mylo Xyloto concerts. Martin also made a line of D-15 style guitars for Guitar Center/Musician's Friend. The Guitar Center model is called the DSR and has a solid sitka spruce top with solid rosewood back and sides. Musician's Friend had two models labeled as a simply Custom-D. Both models have a solid sitka spruce top as well as either solid rosewood or mahogany back and sides.
• Road Series: Designed for extra durability, originally constructed of laminated 3-ply mahogany back and sides and solid spruce top. Also features specially designed top braces, shaped back braces and beveled rear block. Models include the DM. In 2009 the Road Series was discontinued. The Road series was re-released in 2011, this time featuring an upgrade to an all solid wood body, the DRS-1 being all Sapele (a Mahogany alternative), and the DRS-2 being Sapele with a Spruce top. Necks are Stratabond as per the 'X-series' with the bridges and fretboards constructed from Richlite.
• Performing Artist Series: Following the successful debut of its "Performing Artist Series" of acoustic/electric guitars earlier in 2011, C. F. Martin & Co. announces the expansion of this popular line with five new models that are available. The new selection of acoustic/electric guitars are created with the same careful attention to detail, innovation and durability that has become synonymous with the Martin name for over 175 years.
• X-Series: Back and sides constructed from compressed wood fibers (high-pressure laminate or "HPL") and solid Sitka spruce or HPL top. Due to this construction these guitars are more environmentally-friendly. Models include: DX1AE, D12X1AE, DX1-R, DXM, DCX1E, DCX1R3, 000CXE Black, and 000X1AE. Some earlier models used 'Ebonite' (black Micarta) fretboards, later models use koa or striped ebony. Necks on all models are constructed from Stratabond, a laminated wood product used for decades in gun stocks and hunting bows. Some of the more recent models are made in Mexico.
• Little Martin: Designed around a modified O-14 fret body, the Little Martin series is built at a smaller 23" scale length. With the exception of the LX1 and LX1E, which both have solid Sitka spruce tops, Little Martin series guitars are constructed with HPL top, back, and sides. Recent models incorporate a greater amount of synthetic materials, such as Stratabond necks and Micarta (as opposed to rosewood or morado) fretboards and bridges. The guitars employ Modified X-Series "X" bracing, reinforced by a bowtie plate made of graphite. Little Martin series guitars do not have pickguards or fretboard inlays.
• Backpacker: A very small guitar with a body shaped like an elongated triangle, similar in shape to certain types of psaltery and designed to be portable and inexpensive while still being constructed of quality woods.

In the early 1980s, Martin also offered an E-series of electric guitars. The company was not known, as of early May 2012, to have released sales figures for the E-series, and aside from the EB-series variant of electric basses described below, nor was it known as of early May 2012 whether these were still being offered.

Bass guitars

EB 18

EB18 Bass Guitar in flight case.

EB18 Bass Guitar in flight case.

The EB-18 was the first electric bass the Martin company produced in 1979. The single-pickup EB-18 was a partner to Martin's E-series electric guitars. Its scroll-shaped headstock was reminiscent of the Stauffer-style pegheads of early Martins. The EB-28 was added to the line a year later. It had a mahogany body and PJ pickups. Both models were discontinued in 1983.

The general features of the EB-18 are:

• • Scale length 34"
  • Brass nut
  • Badass bridge
  • Single DiMarzio humbucking pickup
  • Through piece solid construction of hard maple and walnut (body wings are glued on to central core), rosewood fretboard
  • Schaller BM series open tuning heads M/C heads with a gear ratio of 1:20. Some M/C heads have C.F. Martin stamped on them but look very similar to Schaller heads
  • Four figure serial number printed on the back (where the 'neck' enters the 'body').
  • The headstock has the C. F. Martin logo printed on the front. The name C. F.Martin and Co. is printed on the back

Pickup

The pickup is a DiMarzio DP120 (model 1) dual pole type with a multicore screened lead. This contains red, white, black and green wires as well as an uninsulated ground wire.

Controls

The EB-18 is provided with a single volume control, one tone control, and a switch for altering the pickup wiring. The switch alters the tone from a bright to a more bassy sound by cutting one pickup coil out of the circuit.

The tone control consists of a 0.1- microfarad capacitor in series with the variable resistor that is adjusted by the control knob. This network is placed directly from the red pickup lead to ground. The volume control is a simple potentiometer wired between the red pickup lead and ground with the wiper being fed to the output jack.

The control compartment is covered on the rear surface of the body by a polished brass plate. The interior of the compartment is coated with a light colored conductive paint to act as a screen against unwanted pickup such as mains hum.

Flight case

The EB-18 was supplied with a quality hard flight case. The EB-18 body fits into the shaped recess and the case takes account of the oddly shaped 'lizard-looking head and large tuning lugs. There is a pair of compartments inside for cables and other items. The inside is lined with a soft, burnt orange color, fur-like material. The case is closed with four toggle latches and has a centrally placed carrying handle.

Martin EB18 Headstock showing Martin machine heads.

Popularity

The EB-18 was not all that popular among bass players, and total production has been estimated at 874. The more expensive follow-up model, the EB-28, was even less popular with a total production of 217 units. See also: E-18 series guitars Martin did not resume building basses until 1989 (during the MTV Unplugged era), in which their approach was more consistent with company history:

Acoustic bass

Martin's B series basses were big flat-tops with 34"-scale mahogany necks. Designed by Dick Boak, these ABGs used the same bodies as Martin's Jumbo guitars; measuring 16" wide with a depth of 4 7/8", they were large enough to produce decent acoustic volume without being ungainly like other maker's attempts. The top was solid spruce, the fingerboard was ebony, and the body was either solid East Indian Rosewood (B40) or solid flamed maple (B-65). A Fishman bridge-pickup system was available adding an "E" in the model number. Both basses were also available with fretless fingerboards.

Martin B65E

In 1992, two more models were added, the single-cutaway BC-40 and the 5-string B-540. Although widely admired for their high quality and lovely appointments, they proved to have limited appeal due to their $2000-plus list prices. By 1997, all four of these initial basses were dropped in favor of the B-1, a lower-priced ABG with laminated mahogany sides as part of Martin's 1 series of guitars. The BM, an even less expensive model in Martin's now discontinued Road series soon followed; it had laminated mahogany sides with a solid mahogany back. Also around this time electronics became standard on Martin basses. The most recent additions are the BC-15, a single-cutaway version with a mahogany top, the BC-16GTE, also a single-cutaway with solid Genuine mahogany back and sides with a gloss top, and the 00C-16GTAE, which is a slimmer thin-line version of the previously mentioned model. As a special edition, Martin offered the Alternative X Bass with jet black High Pressure Laminate back and sides and a Graffiti-patterned Aluminum finish top. This bass was very similar in build to the other guitars in Martin's X series. There have been two Limited Edition Martin acoustic bass models. The first, the SWB Sting Signature Model, was released in 1999 and was made with woods certified by the Rainforest Alliance's SmartWood program. The SWB's top is made with book matched solid Sitka spruce reclaimed from pulp logs, the back, sides and neck are solid certified cherry, and the fingerboard is certified katalox. Sting's signature is inlaid between the 18th and 19th frets, and a label inside the body states that a portion of the sale price is donated to the Rainforest Foundation International. The second and more recent Limited Edition is the B-28KV Klaus Voormann Signature model released in 2008 for the German market. It has a Sitka spruce top with Solid East Indian Rosewood back and sides and a black Ebony fingerboard. The headstock features a unique art design by Klaus as a circular inlay making each bass a one-of-a-kind. In addition to these U.S.-made instruments, Martin also markets Sigma ABGs made in Korea.

Bibliography

• Denyer, Ralph (1982). The guitar handbook. New York: Knopf: Distributed by Random House. pp. 36–45. ISBN 0-394-71257-9. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Denyer, Ralph (1992). "Acoustic guitars: Steel-string acoustic guitars ('Martin guitars' pp. 44–45 and 'Martin 'Dreadnoughts p. 44–45)". The guitar handbook. Special contributors Isaac Guillory and Alastair M. Crawford, Foreword by Robert Fripp (Fully revised and updated ed.). London and Sydney: Pan Books. pp. 44–45. ISBN 0-330-32750-X.
• Gura, Philip F. (2003). C.F. Martin and His Guitars, 1796-1973. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 0-8078-2801-7.
• Gruhn, Elijah (1942). Guitars for Herpetologists. Pleasantville, NY: Reader's Digest. ISBN 0-ohno-ohno-o.
• Washburn, Jim (2002). Martin Guitars: An Illustrated Celebration of America's Premier Guitarmaker. Pleasantville, NY: Reader's Digest. ISBN 0-7621-0427-9. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Wilson, Carey. "Profiles in Quality with Vince Gentilcore". Quality Digest. November 2007. pp. 56–8.

External links

• Official Website
• Car Talk Martin Guitar by Dick Boak, 8:17 - Boak is Martin Guitars Director of Artist and Limited Editions
• Early history of C.F. Martin & Company
• Michael Lorenz: "Stauffer Miscellanea", Vienna 2014