Tulsa, OK (August 21, 2007) - San Dimas Guitars is celebrating the state of Oklahoma’s Centennial Anniversary with its Limited Edition San Dimas Centennial Guitar and Centennial Four-string Bass.
San Dimas Guitars is based in San Dimas, California, (yes, the San Dimas of Bill and Ted fame) and does some of its manufacturing in Tulsa, Oklahoma. With a growing presence in Oklahoma and a company history aligned with SoCal’s hotrod guitar-making tradition, San Dimas is an appropriate maker for such a project.
San Dimas will a make a combined 77 Centennial guitars and basses in honor of Oklahoma’s 77 counties. The guitars will sell for $1,907 -- a nod to the year Oklahoma officially became a state -- and the basses will go for $2,207.
The guitars are completely customizable but come standard with Lindy Fralin pickups, Swtichcraft swtiches, Sperzel locking tuners, GHS strings and a Graph Tech nut. The 25 1/2" scale guitar has 6100 size frets, an Alder body and a maple neck.
There are big plans for the first Oklahoma Centennial Guitar, which bears the serial number 001; notable artists playing in the state between July and November are being asked to play and sign it. Afterwards it will be presented to the Oklahoma Centennial Commission to be used as a part of the State''s Centennial Celebration.
Brad Henderson of Trick Pony was the first player to play and sign the guitar. He played it when the band did a show in Skiatook. (See clip and photo below)
The official Oklahoma Centennial logo is etched into the natural wood finish of the Limited Edition instruments. Each one is hand-crafted with American made parts.
For more information:
San Dimas Guitars
The body shape of this 6-string seems surprisingly ergonomic, but that perception changes when you hold its neck!
And so it goes that I pondered this proliferation of Virgos and Libras, and my hypothesis came into focus. Were we all the result of our parents’ Christmas and New Year’s celebrations?! I have to say, there was a camaraderie discovered among my fellow party babies when I presented my findings to them. Now, being born in the early ’70s also had me thinking of the culture of the times. Hippie life was fading as young people started to realize they had to get a job, and alas, long hair and beards were being replaced by staid 9-to-5 gigs that could slowly suck the life out of you. So, given the cultural mores of that era, I thought that this month I should write about the Sorrento Swinger.
“Hippie life was fading as young people started to realize they had to get a job.”
Born around 1967—maybe in September—these Swingers hailed from the “crazy” design period of the Kawai Co. Kawai produced some of the coolest guitar designs from 1967 to ’69, and there were some very creative guitar designers there on the job. Kawai had poached some of the finest employees from the wreckage of the Shinko Gakki factory (Pleasant, Intermark, etc.) and through the purchase of the Teisco brand. In this era, Kawai usually used three different standard pickups and they all sound great, plus the units are always wired in series, which is just awesome.
For a 25-buck, Japan-made guitar from the ’70s, the Swinger has an elite-looking headstock—and, on this example, most of its tuners.
Now, the Swinger (and similar Kawai-made guitars) came from an era where U.S. importers would order small batches of instruments that were often unique and extremely gonzo. The guitars might have been destined for medium-sized music stores or direct-order catalogs, but whatever the case, the importer usually gave the guitars names. In this instance, it was Jack Westheimer who featured this model as an “exclusive” design. In Westheimer Corporation catalogs from the time, the Swinger carried the A-2T model name (there was another one-pickup model called the A-1) and sold wholesale for $25 in 1967! As the catalog mentioned, these were “priced for the teenaged trade.” This particular guitar featured the Sorrento badge, and was sold through some sort of music store that’s probably long out of business, but all the Swingers were the same.
The Swinger’s large mahogany neck (sans truss rod) is robust and beefy in all the nicest ways. Like, when I was a kid, I was considered a “husky” fit. That’s this neck: husky! The striped pickguard is a Teisco holdover and the controls are as simple as it gets. Two knobs (volume, tone) and two pickup selectors is all there is, but the beauty is in the body. That lower bout is shaped like some sort of 1969 lounge chair. The strap pin is totally in the wrong place, but the big bottom swoop is worth it. Yep, the Swinger was ready to bring in the dawn of the 1970s, but alas, the guitar came and went in a blink.