Now priced at $15,319, this 2-pickup variant on the 1968 Gibson Johnny Smith Double would have sold for $1,145 in the year of its release.
Smith played a lead role in the development of his guitars. Though there are several versions from various brands, they are essentially one model, made and remade to Smith’s liking or disliking. Like a great jazz tune, it was never played quite the same way twice.
In the mid ’50s, Smith first sketched out the theme of his signature model with Guild, not Gibson, having secured an endorsement deal from the then-NYC-based company. He had been playing a Guild X-500 (aka the Stuart), which was a 17″ archtop with two single-coil pickups screwed into the body. But Smith’s heart lay with a custom D’Angelico New Yorker, one with a solid spruce top and precise X-bracing that allowed it to boom like a speaker. He hung out at D’Angelico’s workshop and learned all he could about guitar design.
Unsatisfied with the signature model that Guild produced for him, Smith took his ideas over to Gibson, where he was given nearly complete control over a new design.
Photos courtesy of Reverb/Gitarren Total
Despite the detailed designs Smith handed to Guild’s founding president Al Dronge, what he got was something like a D’Angelico translated through the Guild X-500. Smith was after resonance and tone. He didn’t want anything interfering with the body. He requested that a single DeArmond pickup float above it, with the control knob and output jack affixed to the pickguard rather than the body. This, Guild granted him. But he also had ideas for the carved top and internal construction that he thought would increase balance and sustain, which Guild ignored. Like the X-500, Smith’s top was made with laminated spruce rather than solid wood.
Thus, 1956’s Guild Johnny Smith Award does represent the first record of his signature model—it had the 17″ body and floating pickup that would become a repeating chorus—but it didn’t live up to Smith’s standards. Only 20 or so were made, and soon, Guild and Smith annulled their partnership.
By 1961, Smith was working with Gibson’s Ted McCarty to realize his vision, while Guild had cut Smith’s name and re-released its guitar as the Artist Award. Smith, talking about his first Gibson in 2008, said he was given nearly complete control: “I designed everything myself. I designed how the guitar would be braced, how the top would be carved, the dimensions, the binding, and you name it. The only aspects the company did were some of the cosmetic touches which really did not matter to me.”
“Like a great jazz tune, it was never played quite the same way twice.”
The 17″ Gibson Johnny Smith was introduced with a slightly shallow depth (3 1/8″). Compared to his Guild, it had a 25″ scale (vs. 24.75″), a mini-humbucker rather than the DeArmond, and maybe most importantly to Smith, an X-braced top of carved solid spruce, just like his beloved D’Angelico.
The 2-pickup 1968 Johnny Smith Double variant you see here was first released in 1963. In 1968, a sunburst Johnny Smith Double—with two volume knobs, two tone controls, and a rotary selector—would have retailed for $1,145. Today, you could pay between $8,000–$16,000, depending on condition. This particular guitar, in very good, all-original condition aside from a replacement guard, is listed at $15,319 by the Switzerland-based Reverb seller Gitarren Total.
The guitar has a 17″ body made of flamed maple, with two floating humbuckers.
Photos courtesy of Reverb/Gitarren Total
With Gibson, Smith made the guitar of his dreams, but only for a time. In 1989, he transferred his artist model to Heritage, the company founded by former Gibson luthiers when Gibson moved from Kalamazoo. (Taking a cue from Guild, Gibson re-released its own Johnny Smith model by a different name, Le Grand, in 1993.)
When asked later to explain all his jumping around, Smith said, “Let’s just say I am very particular about instruments with my name on them,”—perhaps, fans of his music might say, as particular with the instruments as the notes he chose to play on them.
In a final twist, his signature model would have one last coda at the place where it all began. In 2002, Smith and Guild reunited, this time with renowned guitar maker Bob Benedetto at the helm of the archtop’s construction. The last Guild Smith signature stayed in production until 2007, while Smith himself passed away in 2013.
Sources: Reverb listings and Price Guide data, Gibson June 1968 price list, Gruhn’s Guide to Vintage Guitars, American Guitars: An Illustrated History by Tom Wheeler, “Johnny Smith Goes Full Circle” by Charles H. Chapman for Fender Players Club, “‘Just the Essential Thing’: Bill Frisell and Mary Halvorson Honor Johnny Smith’s Jazz Legacy” by Nick Millevoi for Reverb.
Released at the same time as the SE DGT, the SE McCarty 594, which is offered as a double-cutaway and a less expensive single-cutaway model, is another phenomenal value. It costs just $950. For comparison’s sake, a USA-built S2 version of the McCarty 594 will set you back around $1,999, while a premium, USA-made, Core McCarty 594 will cost, well, serious bucks.
That McCarty Magic
In the mid 1990s, Paul Reed Smith worked with guitar industry icon Ted McCarty, who was Gibson’s president from 1950–1966. During that time, he had a hand in the design and development of the PAF humbucker pickup, Tune-o-matic bridge, and guitars including the ES-335, Explorer, Firebird, Flying V, and SG. In 1994, PRS introduced several models that were products of the McCarty collaboration, including the McCarty 594. The quality and performance of those guitars suggested the meeting of the minds was much more than simple marketing.
The SE McCarty 594 captures the essence of a premium McCarty with its drop-dead gorgeous flame-maple veneer top over mahogany body, with a gloss polyurethane finish. The 22-fret set neck is mahogany, and the 10"-radius rosewood fretboard looks sharp and upscale adorned with trademark PRS bird inlays. The closed-back tuners look attractively vintage and hold tuning exceptionally well. At the other end of the strings, a zinc and brass adjustable, two-piece bridge is both stable and another hint to the guitar’s Gibson influence.
Workmanship on the SE McCarty 594 is very clean, both cosmetically and functionally. Volume-knob swells revealed not one trace of static, and the knobs and push-pull pots are all dead quiet when switched. In terms of playability, the SE McCarty 594’s neck feels a little chunky, at least for my tastes. But even though I prefer thinner necks, there is no questioning how natural and comfortable it feels in hand. The 24.594" scale length (reflected in the guitar’s 594 name) is slightly shorter than conventional PRS and Gibson scale lengths. But that tiny difference also helps make string bending feel extra easy. Our particular guitar came with a great setup at medium-low action. It also came in a very nice gig bag with additional foam padding inserts. If our guitar is any indication, you’ll be able to take one out of a shipping box and go straight to a gig or recording studio with total confidence.
Sublime Sounds
To put the SE 594 through its paces, I hooked it up with Fender Super-Sonic and Mesa/Boogie Mark IV amps and dirt pedals including a Hermida Distortion and Wampler Pinnacle. The two low-output 58/15 LT “S” humbucking pickups, unsurprisingly, have an old-school PAF-vibe and are rich with clarity and vintage soul. The two tone knobs feature push-pull functionality and switch between humbucker and single-coil sounds. The volume difference between humbucker and single-coils is subtle. You’ll hear it, but it won’t be nearly as jarring as it is on many other guitars with the same feature. In both pickup configurations, the dynamic range is incredibly wide. Played clean and set up bright, I could play spaghetti Western ideas when I picked close to the bridge. But depending on my attack, I could also generate anything from whisper-quiet notes to all-out aggression. Add reverb, delay, and a few double-stop 10ths, and the PRS sounded positively angelic.
If our guitar is any indication, you’ll be able to take one out of a shipping box and go straight to a gig or recording studio with total confidence.
With added dirt, the neck pickup was incredibly warm and creamy without sounding woofy, even with the tone rolled back quite a bit. The bridge pickup, meanwhile, flirted with near-infinite sustain when I paired it with the Mesa/Boogie Mark IV, generating killer fusion sounds that made shredding feel effortless. Rolling the tone knob back up on the bridge pickup yields an exemplary lead sound. And with less dirt, it makes beautiful, jangly rhythm sounds.
The Verdict
The SE 594 proves, as so many PRS SE guitars have before, that affordable doesn’t require sacrifice of quality or sound. For anyone who’s lusted after a McCarty 594 but hasn't had the money, or who fears nicking up a guitar that precious, the SE McCarty 594 is an accessible gem. It can sound mellow, fat, clear, or beastly. And the sub-$1K price tag makes it a steal for a guitar that looks more expensive and has the tonal range, stability, and quality to make it a gigging workhorse. There’s just not much out there in the electric guitar universe that can beat the value of this extraordinary instrument.
PRS SE McCarty 594 Demo | First Look
